Richard Wagner; a sketch of his life and works

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Richard Wagner

A SKETCH,
OF HIS LIFE AND WORKS

Franz Muncker

Translated from the German by D. Landman
Revised by the author

Illustrations by Hhinrich Nisle

Price 2 sn.

BAMBERG

BUCHNER, PUBLISHER
BucHMiu Bros, koyal bav. couri' I'UULisiihKs

(J .!
1891^

PRINTED BY KNORR & HIRTH IN MUNICH

ZINCOGRAVURES
BY OSCAR CONSEE IN MUNICH

Preface.

Ihe biography of Richard Wagner has already
been repeatedly, and in some cases very well written.
As long as in the Meister's autobiography and letters
not entirely new sources are opened to us, the work of
Karl Friedrich Glasenapp, containing two volumes,
may, for the present at least, be regarded as an ex-
hausting book, which offers all that the modern reading
world might care to know of Wagner's outer life. Like
Wagner's other biographers however, Glasenapp
treated the inner life of the artist and of his works,
with more brevity. For later investigators here much
has been left to be done. Friends of Wagner have,
for some part, filled the gaps, by carefully investi-
gating the artistic significance and, in general, the rich
intellectual merits of his aspirations and creations. In
a similar and again dissimilar manner, this my little
book shall help to lessen these wants. As namely these
studies on Wagner's art have, for the most part, been
of a purely aesthetic nature, I have sought to examine

the being and growth of this art principal!}' from an
historical stand-point, and to regard the literary works
and dramas of the artist in connection with his life, as
well as with the earlier and contemporary develop-
ment of european and especially german intellectual life.>
Historical valuation alone, reveals to us the inner-
most being and the entire greatness of a world-
historical appearance. It alone lastingly preserves us
from narrow-minded partiality, as its aim can only be
the truth proved by incontestible facts. What from its
futile earthly existence has been swept away by death,
it reawakens to new, eternal life.

If any of the late departed illustrious spirits of
the german people can lay claim to a strict historical
valuation, it is Wagner. His importance extends far
beyond the narrow boundaries of a single art; it was
therefore necessary to depict his development not alone
in the dominion of music, but principally in that of lite-
rature, and to determine his relations to the thinkers
and poets of the german people and of other nations,
who have had any traceable or important influence upon
him. Amongst the numerous works treating of Wagner,
only a few aim at an historical judgement in this sense,
so different essays and pamphlets by A. Ettlinger,
Wolfgang Golther, Karl He eke 1, Emerich
Kastner, Max Koch, Richard Pohl, Adolf Sand-
berger, Wilhelm Tappert, Hans Paul von Wol-
zogen, the »Katalog einer Richard- Wagner- Bibliothek*
by Nicolaus Oesterlein, and above all, the »Richard-

Wagnei--Jahi-buch« , edited by Joseph Kiirschner,
which, unfortunately, never extended beyond the first
volume. Thankfully I have made use of what I found
in these and other previous works, but have at all
points endeavored to increase, by own investigations,
the knowledge transmitted to me by others. Of the
entire independence of my work, I do not deem it
necessary to assure readers possessed of judgement and
knowledge of the subject; just these readers however,
I would beg for their indulgence, if in this little sketch
I, for the present, have only alluded to what I have
reserved for a later, more extensive statement, to
prove and detail more precisely.

Thanks to the zealous efforts of my publisher,
my little book has appeared rich in artistic embellish-
ments. Several portraits of Wagner, after the best
photographs and original paintings, as well as pictures
of the exterior and interior of the Festspielhouse in
Bayreuth, and other buildings remarkable in Wagner's
history, adorn the small volume. A farther, great and
valuable enrichment it received through the photo-
graphic copy of a large paragraph from a manuscript
of Wagner and of two pages from the original score
of the »Walkiare«, and finally through the faithful fac-
similes of almost all the original sketches of the scenery
to the »Nibelungen« and »Parsifal«, which were designed,
according to the wishes of the Meister, for the Biihnen-
festspiele in Bayreuth of 1876 and 1882. For the friendly
readiness with which the trustees of the property be-

longing to His Majesty King Otto of Bavaria, placed
at my disposal the original scores found in the posthu-
mous papers of King Ludwig II., as well as for the
kindness with which the Bruckner brothers in Co-
burg disinterestedly lent their numerous sketches of
the scenery, I here allow myself to express my sincere
and respectful thanks.

Munich, the ii* of May 1891.

Franz Muncker.

r

Sv»,^ ^-^

Lmongst the aims, pur-
sued by the founders of mo-
dern german Hterature , one
arises above all others, the
drama, the highest form of the
poetic art, that form, which
acts most perceptibly and most
directly not only upon the ear
but upon the eye of the people,
that form , which no longer is
purely poetical , but can only
with the assistance of the sister
arts , awaken its production to
full life. Since Lessing's time, all great german authors
have striven with the most impassioned eagerness, to
fulfill this aim. All, even those like Klopstock and
Wieland, who little understood the nature and the
requirements of the real drama, had at one time
entertained the idea of creating a national german
drama. It inspired Goethe, when he wrote his

Muncker, Wagner. 1

»Gotz«:, »Iphigenia« and > Faust « ; it filled Lessing
and Schiller with enthusiasm, and animated them to
their greatest literary productions; it moved Heinrich
von Kleist's heart with the most ardent longing,
which in the end, unstilled in its highest desires, turned
into despair. Glorious poetical productions were the
results of these endeavors , productions , filled with
national spirit, which will redound to the eternal honour
of german authors, people and literature. But the new
in form and contents entirely and peculiarly german
drama, these poets and those who strove with them,
could not yet create. This was prevented by the cosmo-
politan spirit of the time, apparent in the entire german
literary life of the last century, in concert with the
manner of the dramatists of leaning to foreign models,
principally to Shakespeare and the antique tragedians.
This new, perfect german drama, Richard Wagner
gave us , a drama essentially german , in contents as
well as in form, founded on old national legends and
poetry, entirely inspired with german spirit, and in its
complete artistic character of a peculiarity, such as
only the german people could bring forth. Herein
lies Wagner's great historical merit, not in his emi-
nent musical production, nor in his, in themselves power-
ful literary works. He is, above all, dramatist, and music
as well as poetry are for him but means to the achieve-
ment of the one great purpose of the drama.

For the drama in its perfection, as Wagner con-
ceives it, is at once music and poetry, it shall only
reproduce in the german spirit, and with richer, fuller
artistic means, that united work of art of the Greeks,
which bound the single arts (besides poetry and music
the plastic and mimical arts) to one organic whole, the
attic tragedy. The masters of german literature looked:
upon the ancients as the highest models in every art;
following their example, Wagner likewise chose the
ancients for his patterns. What he strove to achieve,
was, in the idea itself, nothing absolutely new. Since

the commencement of the newer aesthetics, since the
beginning of the last century, great and influential
thinkers and poets, such as Batteux, Voltaire,
Rousseau, Diderot in France, Sulzer, Wieland,
.Lessing, Herder, Schiller, Goethe, Schelling,
Schleiermacher, E. T. A. Hoffmann and others in
Germany had arisen, repeatedly and always more im-
pressively demanded a similar united work of art, and
for the fulfillment of this purpose pointed to the opera,
for which Gluck and Mozart were finding new paths.
Through its ennoblement and the greater dramatic depth
of i$s poetic contents, it was to arise to the ideal of art.
What, however, these men had partly only touched and
had only theoretically expressed, Wagner had first, with
the strictest consistency, allowed to ripen and then de-
veloped into artistic reality. At once poet and com-
poser, he brought his works directly in contact with
all that classica,l and romantic german authors had given,
in poetry as well as in music, independently improved
their ideas, their subjects and forms, and led both poetry
and music to the last crowning state of that development,
through which, for more than hundred years, the german
spirit had slowly neared the ideal of the drama.

Wagner's lifetime fell into a period in which the
german nation, through inward and outward conflicts,
was slowly gaining its present position. In these con-
flicts, Wagner took but a slight and passing part.
But not only personally did he, during long years,
suffer under the distress, which the inward conflicts
brought to the german people; his mental struggles,
in seeking new victories for the german art, went
hand in hand with the endeavors and achievements,
which led his nation to political liberty and greatness.
It is no accident, that directly after the events of
the years 18J.8 and 1.849J Wagner's revolutionary

-£ssay-§__on_art_j£peared, in which he, for the first
time, expressed and theoretically expounded Jiis i^eal

jDf^jtliedrama , that, at the same epoch, the plan of

I*

that work was created, which, for the first time, was
to give this ideal a reality. It was no less chance,
that this work, as a perfected artistic creation, only
then was given to the public, \yhen, out of the year^J
of uncertain endeavors and sorrow -bringing strifes,
which had seen it ripen, the united Germany and the'
new empire had arisen. The »Buhnenfestspielhouse< '
in Bayreuth, and the performances which took place in
it, during the summers of 1876 and 1882, were the
highest achievement of Richard Wagner's life and'
work, not less, however, the direct artistic result of
Germany's political triumphs in 1870 and 1871.

"teSii"

II.

ilhelm Richard Wagner was born in
Leipsic, on the 22'' of May 1813. He
I was the youngest child of a numerous
^ family, in which the interest in art, par-
ticularly for the stage, was at home. The father,
I Friedrich Wagner, clerk at the city-court of Leipsic,
who was born in the same year with Beethoven
(1770), cultivated this taste. Exactly half a year after
Richard's birth, on the 22"^ of November 181 3, he died
of typhoid fever. The widow, Johanna, whose maiden
name was Bertz (born 1778 in Weissenfels, died 1848),
found a faithful counsellor in a younger friend of the
deceased, Ludwig Geyer, born 1780 in Eisleben,
educated in the legal profession, active as portrait-
painter and comedy- writer , particularly however as a
successful actor, and, at that time already, member of
the court-theatre in Dresden. In the year 1814, he
married Richard's mother, and soon after, the family
took up their abode in Dresden. With loving eyes
Geyer watched over the boy's development, whom
he hoped to make a distinguished man. But the boy's
manifold talents and inclinations made him uncertain
as to which art, in particular, he should educate him.
In the mean while,, Richard made good progress at
the school in Dresden, showed himself, however, by
no means to be a phenomenon, moreover played and

romped merrily, like a true and healthy child. On the
30'*' of September 1821, he also lost his good step-
father. To lighten his mother's household-cares, a
brother of Geyer took Richard, for a year, to Eis-
leben. Here also, the boy visited a private school.
Then, in December 1822, he became a member of
the Kreuz-school in Dresden. Greek legends and history
interested him principally, and influenced his first poe-
tical efforts. He translated a part of the » Odyssey*,
and sketched tragedies after the pattern of the alder-
man Johann August Apel in Leipsic (1771 — 1816),
a vi^eak imitator of the ancients. "With the same zeal
however, he gave himself up to the study of Shake-
speare. Mightily moved by the works of the english
dramatist, he, during two years, carried the plan of a
tragedy in his mind, in which, as it seems, Shake-
spearian ideas were to be romantically and adven-
turously heightened. His musical instincts were as yet
slumbering. Only the »Freischutz« and its composer,
who, since 1817, was court-conductor of the orchestra
in Dresden, the lad admired enthusiastically.

With the return of the family to Leipsic (end of
1827), some changes in the outward as well as mental
life of young Richard took place. It is true, that
his uncle, Adolf Wagner, scientifically and artistically
equally educated, a thorough philologist and student of
literature, an industrious and versatile translator, who
also had often essayed original poetry, gained great
influence over him; nevertheless, the zeal with which
Richard had distinguished himself in his school-studies,
abated. Instead, the Gewandhouse concerts, in which
besides Mozart he, above all, heard Beethoven, awa-
kened his love for music. At the same time, the works
of the romantic authors, who in their poetry often strove
to achieve purely musical. harmony, led him to the study
of this art. These authors Richard now perused with
a readily susceptible spirit. His favorites were the
ghostly, adventurous tales of the genial Ernst Theo-

dor Amadeus Hoffmann, poet, musician and painter
combined, who, as poetical prophet, proplaimed the
innermost nature and secret problems of music, and

chose to consider it the
representative and very
highest revelation of art.
Several of Hoffmann's
subjects, particularly those
of the middle ages , im-
pressed themselves, already
at that period, deeply in
the mind of his youthful ad-
mirer; the epigrammatical,
in spite of its outward
calmness violently excit-
ing, and with humor,
satire and irony richly
impregnated style of
the romantic narrator,

strongly influenced, even after
the space of ten years and
later, the author Wagner.
Upon the youth, who had just
passed the boundaries of boy-
hood, the excentric, fantastic
imagination of Hoffmann, the
manner in which he gave life
to abstract ideas, the way in

Wagner's homestead in Leipsic.

which he inextricably mingled the fabulously wonderful
with reality, were particularly influential. Hoffmann's
excentricity pictures itself, outwardly as well as inwardly,
in Richard's first attempts at musical composition. He
had thought to imitate Beethoven's daring grandeur and
profundity, when, after several attempts at chamber-
music, he turned to larger orchestra-compositions, and,
in particular, composed several concert-ouvertures which
were once or twice performed, principally in Leipsic.
This model was so inspiring, that already his first ouver-
ture, which greatly puzzled his listeners and abounded
in confused peculiarities, was able to express, what de-
manded respect of earnest musicians. The tuition which
Theodor Weinjig, a learned musician (cantor at the
Thomas-school), gave him in counterpoint, freed him of
his exaggeratedly bombastic style. He_no^_learned to
jnore appreciate Mozart and Haydn. Under the latter's
influence, he composed a sonata~ for~^iano , the first
composition which was brought to print. Other com-
positions for the piano followed, partly as little original :
as the first. A symphony in C-sharp was more
interesting. It revealed, next to his admiration for Beet-
hoven, the industrious study of Mozart and, besides
several original ideas, a remarkable skill in counterpoint.
The symphony was, for the first time, performed in
the summer of 1832 by Dionys Weber, the director
of the conservatory at Prague, whom Wagner visited
on his return from a trip to Vienna. The young com-
poser had finished the gymnasium in Leipsic and, for
several terms, had heard philosophy and aesthetics at
the university, without exchanging music, which he now
recognized as his calling, for any professional study.|
What, in the year 1832, he saw of Viennese music-life,
disappointed him bitterly; but in Prague, and during the
following winter in Leipsic, he began the composition
of his fir st opera. »Die Hochzeit« (»The wedding*).
Already he had gained the conviction, that he must
only set a text-book, which he himself had written to

music ; by these means alone, the dramatic effect, in his
eye of the greatest importance, was to be attained.
Immermann's »Cardenio und Celinde« (i826) gave jmp
his subjec t ; he considerably shortened the action of this
tragedy, and greatly simplified different motives. The
conclusion of his tragedy he formed in correspondence
to the catastrophe in the »Braut von Messina* and in
connection with the general fundamental ideas of the
fatalistic tragedy. Howeve'r, the excentric text-book found
disfavour in the eyes of the poet's sister, who, as a
talentedacitress , was__c£xtainly capable o^ forming a
correct judgement in such matters. In consequence,
Wagner never completed his composition, which had
principally followed the trodden path of the german
opera, though Weinlig had given a glad approbation
to a septetto in the commencement of the work. His
text-book he completely destroyed.

Another opera however, begun soon after »Die
Hochzeit*, was led to its conclusion, but only in Wiirz-
burg, whither Wagner had, in February 1833, followed
his brother Albert, who was actor, singer and manager
there. In the german translation of count Carlo Gozzi's
theatrical books, which had alrea'dy 1777 appeared in
Bern, the youth found the tragi-comical fairy drama
:The woman a serpent* (>La donna serpente*). Some
time ago already, the piece had been used as an opera-
text »Die Sylphen«; of this opera however, Wagner
could have known but little. Gozzi's fairy drama he
now transformed into an opera, which he entitled »Die
Feen« (> The, fa iries*). For the most part he altered
the names of tHeper^ons and omitted some of the un-
important characters entirely; but in general, he pre-
served the course of the action, the division into three
acts and the most important personages of the original.
Only several traits, which appeared too rudely farcical,
and had served Gozzi for personal satirical purposes,
he banished, and omitted or at least mildened all that,
which, through the exaggeration of the marvellous, re-

10

minded tod much of the fairy tale. Instead, he ennobled
and deepened the earnest, humanly touching scenes of
his model. The contents, in spite of many abridgements,
he changed but little; in the individual expression how-
ever, he showed hiniself entirely as original poet, who,
although often in conflict with language and versification,
was, now and again,, able to fill his words with truly
poetical splendour. Into the exposition, he knew better
than the Italian to bring clearness and harmony; the
events occurring in the second act of his work, he ar-
ranged so, that a fuller dramatic life unfolded itself
upon the stage, and consequently a stronger theatrical
effect was attained. To other changes he was led by
the regard to the musical composition, by the desire
to add here an aria, there a duet, trio or quartet, to
bring in a chorus, and, above all, to close every act
with a grand ensemble.

Musical considerations, above all, decided him, to
completely change the end of the opera. In Gozzi's
work, the fairy, who, for an earthborn man's sake, is
willing to resign immiartality^f becomes transformed into
a serpent, because her husband cannot bear the trials,
through which he is " to prove himself worthy of his
happiness. But now the guilty man rises to almost
superhuman action , conquers in combats , that might
terrify the most valiant, kisses the horrible serpent and
thereby breaks the spell, regaining for himself the beloved
wife, and for her the longed for mortality. 'NVa gjer
^transfo rms the fairy Ada into a stone, and lets her become
released byTKe conjuring song ofh^TTusBanSTT^otTiotv-
ever does she now becom'ea mortal ;"he, whom the divine
power of love has lifted far above common humanity,
is fit to follow the beloved, to gain with her immortality,
and to accompany her into the realms of fairy-land. The
poem, which, in its praise of the might of song, reminds,
one of the legend of Orpheus and Eurydike, slightly
also of the end of Shakespeare's >Winter's-tale«,
has, through the changes effected by Wagner, not only

II

paid more justice to the demands of the musician, biit
has been brought to more fully correspond to the re-
quirements of poetical justice. The german poet, since
he let his hero finally become endowed with immor-
tality, returned, perhaps unwittingly, to the oldest legen-
dary version of the union of an immortal woman and
a mortal man, to Kalidasa's drama »Urvasi«, which,
already in the year 1828, had appeared in a german
translation, (by O. L. B. Wolff). At the same time,
he gave utterance to an idea which, at that epoch
only generally expressed, was in his later works often
repeated, the idea of the elevation from mortality to
everlasting joys, through the power of an all-redeeming
love. Other fundamental ideas of the later Wagnerian
theories are already contained in the »Feen«, in parti-
cular the » Lohengrin* idea: only so long may a human
being be united in love to one from another sphere,
and partake of the eternal happiness, as he does not
doubtingly seek to discover the secret of the beloved
one's descent.

In the composition as well, we now and again
find passages which remind us of the later Wagner;
but only here and there, where the young composer
sought either to characterize dramatic situations of par-
ticular importance by the magic of tones, or musically
to awaken half lyrical, idyllic, but principally elegiac
impressions. In the ouvertiire, we find themes which
we rediscover almost unchanged in later compositions,
such as the » Faust- ouverture«, »Rienzi« and >Fliegende
Hollander «. Admirable is the manner in which he con-
trols the technicalities, the treatment of the chorus, of
single instruments and the general employment of the
orchestra for dramatic purposes.. Too great lengths,
the gravest fault of the. composition, most betray the
beginner. In the recitative, the beginner again becomes
apparent: in it above all, the uncertain search of
the composer after free and original melody is felt,
and in later years W.agner himself often complained

12

of this want. A far greater and, in part, riper musical
endowment was to be found in the arias, the concerted
pieces, the grand ensembles and in the ouverture. In
spite of a pronounced tendency to original compositions
and forms, the youth was yet still, in many cases, an
imitator of foreign example. That his musical style in
the »Feen«, was dependent on Beethoven, "Weber
and Marschner, Wagner himself in later years con-
fessed. But not alone these, reminiscences from Mo-
zart's operas, Schubert's songs and the influence of
many less important contemporary composers are appa-
rent in the >Feen<: ; one even believes sometimes to find
resemblance with Rossini's and the younger Italians'
style, with whose works Wagner had, just at that time,
become acquainted. ' But the fundamental character of
his music was still essentially german, and the example
of Weber in particular, riiore than of any other how-
ever alluring models, influenced him mightily.

Immediately after the completion of his opera (Ja-
nuary 1834), the youth returned to Leipsic. Besides
his just accomplished work, he had by no means wasted
his time in the musically very active city of Wiirzburg,
and had, in particular, as chorus- and solo-repetitor at
the theatre, acquired the first routine, which was sb
necessary for the later incomparably genial leader. In
Leipsic, he was to find disappointments - — • he was not
able to bring about a performance of the »Feen< —
and new impressions. For the first time in his life, he
heard Wilhelmine Schroder-Devrient in Bellini's
operas, an artist, whose extraordinary personality posi-
tively electrified him, and whose picture appeared be-
fore his mind's eye, whenever he felt the impulse to
new artistic endeavor. Sung by this artist, he found the
modern Italian music, whose weaknesses- he fully com-
prehended, still to possess many traits worthy of imi-
tation : he found it to contain a happy, joyous spirit, which
even if frivolous, was here immeasurably better expressed,
than in the conscientiously ponderous german composi-

13

tions. And joy in living he now chose for his motto. It
was preached by those authors to whom, at the time, he
felt himself principally drawn: Wilhelm Heinse, the
apostle of the highest artistic and lowest sensual plea-
sures, amongst all the authors of the last century the
one endowed with the warmest enthusiasm and finest
comprehension for music, the authors of the » Young
Germany^, Heinrich Laube, with whom, years ago
already, Wagner had become acquainted, Ludwig
Borne, Karl Gutzkow, Gustav Konig, and that
poet, who, for some time in the future, was to most
strongly influence the young, rising artist, Heinrich
Heine. Full life in the present, to grasp and enjoy
the moment, freedom in politics, morals and literature,
even to the most regardless emancipation of the flesh,
were taught by these authors, whose eyes turned long-
ingly to France, where the revolutionary war, for some
time already, was raging against all, that until now in
state and society, in religion, art and science had
appeared as law. In concert with them, Wagner. now.
turned to french literature and music. Here Auber's
>Muette de Fortici« , an entirely revolutionary work,
met his eyes, a composition which powerfully and last-
ingly excited him, an opera of a remarkable dramatic
unity, at the same time >burningly hot and fascinatingly
entertaining*, as Wagner, as late as the year 1871,
expressed himself.

The deep impression which all these artistic ap-
pearances had made upon him, manifested itself in an
essay on the german opera (1834), in which he warmly
declaimed against the german narrow-mindedness and the
semblance it gave itself of musical erudition, and par-
ticularly in the large composition of the opera »Das
Liebesverbotoder die Novize von Palermo* (»The
interdiction of love or the novice of Palermo*), whose
plan was laid down during a summer-trip 1834 inTeplitz.
Shakespeare's »Measure for measure* gave him his
subject. Again, as he had already done in the »Feen«,

14

Wagner diminished the number of active characters,
bereft the action of different episodes, and altered the
end,- until it offered thankful motives to the musician.
At the same time, the new conclusion practically de-
monstrated the revolutionary spirit of the young com-
poser. Into the centre of the action, Shakespeare
puts his duke, who, by his subjects, is believed to be
absent, but in monk's disguise is dwelling amongst them.
Critically he observes the confusion arising partly from
the unnaturally cruel strictness with which his substitute
punishes all sensual offences, partly from this substitute's
own sensual passions ; at first, unrecognized, he interferes,
essays to milden and pacify, and finally seeks in open
court the justice, which, measure for measure, is dealt
out. To dramatically illustrate this morally legal prin-
ciple was, above all, Shakespeare's aim; the represen-
tation of the sensual transgressions of free love served
but as means to the accomplishment of his purpose.
Wagner, on the contrary, influenced by the teachings
, of »Young Germany*, painted the free and open sen-
suality for its own sake. In doing away with the earnest,
judicial conclusion, he let this sensuality triumph, through
its own force, over the strict puritanical hypocrisy: the
unnaturally cruel censorship of the governor turns itself,
in the end, against him; not alone his sovereign, his
own heart punishes the hypocritical fool, who had
thought to prove himself master of love and nature.
The people, however, free themselves from his tyranny
without awaiting the duke's return, and the revolt breaks
out in the midst of the wildest carnival sport.

The action of Shakespeare's play hardly lost
any of its dramatic effects through this simplification of
its motives; by these means, the theatrical effect was
rather heightened. In the minutiae of the characteristic
and the poetical execution of the details, Wagner,
as is readily understood, could not, although he had
endeavored with great zeal (and not in vain), compete
with his predecessor. But the entire problem he was,

15

in a modern manner, better able to solve, and, in some
instances, even succeeded in deepening the spiritual mo-
tives. To make the development of the drama more
probable, he chose, instead of Vienna, where Shake-
speare laid his plot, Palermo, a city in a more southern
clime, whose inhabitants are filled with greater sensuality.
The remembrance of Auber's »Muette<, in which opera
a similar revolt in southern Italy takes place, perhaps
also of the Sicilian Vesper, may have further decided
him in choosing the local colouring for the old tale,
which, besides, Shakespeare had found in italian
novels. The puritanical governor, Wagner changed
into a German; the irony with which, in the essay on
the german opera (written at the same time), he treated
the ponderous dignity of his compatriots, who would
not acknowledge the right of existence of a light sen-
suality, reappeared, in this work, in a new form.

The young musician sought to keep his composition
free from the learned heaviness which characterized
the german masters. The French and Italians, parti=_
cularly Auber and Bellini, so entirely different from
the models he had taken for the »Feen«, now influ-
enced him. This manner of composition with all its
trivialities and search for purely superficial effect, its
vocal style rich in cadenzas and runs, its often crude
and noisy instrumentation, "Wagner unreflectingly imi-
tated. Even themes, directly similar to those of the
Italians, he did not avoid. However, even if, in this
composition of so pronounced a romanic type, he seemed
to deviate entirely from the german masters, still now
and again an isolated melody led to the suspicion, that,
in time, he would return to the paths, which, as follower
of Beethoven and Weber, he had formerly pursued.
Amidst the french and italian melodies of the »Liebes-
verbot«, there appeared from time to time themes which
we find in' his later works, one even, which returns in
Tannhauser's narration of his pilgrimage to Rome.

With the individual compositions of the new school.

i6

which Wagner had joined, he found occasion to be-
come practically well acquainted in his capacity as mu-
sical director of the Bethmann theatre- comipany in
Magdeburg (fall of the year 1834). Zealously he gave
himself up to his new duties, by .which he profited a
great deal, led not only the opera-performances, but
also now and again a concert, composed, besides the
>Liebesverbot->;, several smaller works, particularly a
cantata for the New-year of 1835, and occasionally ex-
pressed, in newspaper-articles, opinions, similar to those
he had laid down in his former essay. on the german
opera. A journey, undertaken in summer 1835 on
theatrical business, led him to Nuremberg, where he re-
newed his acquaintance with Wilhelmine Schroder-
Devrient, and where his admiration for the extraordinary
songstress received new impetus. In Kosen he met his
old friend Laube, who did not withhold his praises
of the opera »Das Liebesverbot<. At last, on the
29''^ of March 1836, Wagner was able to bring his
opera on the stage. It was performed immediately,
before he forever left Magiebiirg. The indifference of
the public to the theatre, which counted many able
members, caused the. dissolution of the Bethmann-
company in easter 1836; only one overhurried and, on
this account, ineffective performance of the »Liebesverbot«
was possible ; none of the composer's efforts, in Berlin
as well as Leipsic, to bring about the performance of
his opera, were crowned with success. In the hope
of finding a new position, he went in summer to Konigs-
berg; but only in Tanuarv 1837. did he succeed in ob-
taining employment as-inusicaLdii:ecto£jn_that city.

Some time before, on the 24* of November_i836,
he had married the actress Minna Planer, who to-
gether with him had been in Magdeburg, and had there
become engaged to him. For long years, Minna,
simple and good at heart, has, with the most devoted
love, borne trouble and privations with the husband,
whose artistic genius she was not able to appreciate.

Richard Wagner after a drawing by E. B. Kietz (1850).

17

And Wagner was with the same fondness attached to
his »poor wife*, whose misery only accentuated the
bitterness of his own sufferings. Only, when the mental
contrasts of the two appeared more and more sharply,
they, after long inward conflicts, separated in August
1861. During several years Minna resided in Dresden,,
and died in the same city, on the 2S^^ of January i866.
Poor and narrow circumstances encompassed the
young couple in Konigsberg. Under these auspices,
Wagner never could arise to real artistic creation.
Only one escape out o f all this miserx-S eemed possib le ;
h e must compose an opera, which, from Paris, should
__makeitstriumphant entry *oin'' the™german stage. But
how should he penetr3te~to Pans? He'woulH'pgrsuade
Scribe to write him the text-book to this all-important
composition. Novel upon novel he read to find a fitting
subject. Finally he altered the principal scenes of a long-
winded novel by Heinrich Konig »Die hohe Braut*,
whose poetical execution he offered to Scribe. In
vain however; five years later, he himself wrote, em-
ploying the plan of 1837, a theatrically effective text-
book, containing four acts, in light verses, which his
friend Johann Heinrich Kittl, under the title »Bianca
and Giuseppe, or the French before Nice«, set to music.
In the meanwhile, he lost, after the Konigsberg theatre
had ended in bankruptcy, his modest position, and only
after several months of care and privations, a new and
better prospect opened before him. In autumn 1837,
he received a call as first musical director to the theatre
in Riga, which Holtei had but just newly founded.

Here, Wagner found better means and really
artistic endeavor, and with the most joyful energy at
once took active part. He composed supplementary
arias to be sung by the artists in the most popular
operas, wrote, after a very much modernized tale
from the »Arabian nights*, a comic opera >Die gliick-
liche Barenfamilie* (»The _happy b ear-family*), but
rejected it again, as soorTasTie notice37~tHat he was

Muncker, Wagner. 2

too closely following the very frivolously trivial manner
of the modern French and Italians, performed in concerts,!
which he had occasion to lead, two ouvertures, which
within the last years he had composed, and whose style
betrayed a peculiar position, intermediary between
Beethoven and Bellini. Hardly however, had a year
passed, but matters assumed an entirely different aspect;
the triviality of the artists, the uneducated audiences,
the hackneyed uniformity of the operas which he was
again and again forced to repeat, filled him with aver-
sion. With conscientious rigor, he fulfilled his duties
as leader, but for the rest kept away from the music-
life in Riga, devoting his spare time to that composition,
which, as he ardently hoped, would, immediately on
its appearance, deliver him from his present stagnant
and straightened circumstances, the composition of his
»Rienzi«.

So neared the spring of 1839. Wagner's con-
tract with the theatre in Rigaexpired. At the same
time, Holtei gave up his position as director. Now,
the young composer was no longer to be held. The
text-book and the score of the first two acts of his
>Rienzi« were just finished; in the metropolis of euro-
pean art, he wished to complete and send his opera
into the world. In Pillau, he and his wife embarked
for London. For a few days he rested in that city,
and then journeyed to France, where he spent several
weeks in Boulogne-sur-mer before going to Paris , in
which city he arrived in the summer of 1839.

ich in hopes, but all the poorer in worldh"
goods, Wagner had approached the
metropolis. How quickly his proud
expectations were to be disappointed !
His attempts to make his half-finished
opera known, or, until its completion,
at least to bring his »Liebesverbot« on the Paris
stages, failed entirely. He had yet no renowned name
and neither the wealth nor the patrons which, in spite
of this want, might have helped him to reach the goal
of his desires. Certainly Meyerbeer, with whom he
had become acquainted in Boulogne, did all in his
power to recommend him. But Meyerbeer was just
at that- period far too often absent from Paris, as
to be personally able to successfully aid another.
Wagner also met Heinrich Laube in the french
capital, and this friend made him acquainted with Hein-
rich Heine. But neither of these men could be of
assistance to the musician whose goal was the grand
opera.

Under theses circumstances , which often brought
him to the brink of the bitterest want, the composition
of »Rienzi« could, only with many interruptions, be
continued. He was often obliged to gain his daily
bread with his pen, and with inferior musical works.
He made piano -scores, arrangements from popular

20

operas for different instruments, and even accepted the
order of a Boulevard-theatre for the composition of an
ordinary vaudeville. Besides, he set several romances
and poems of Ronsard, Victor Hugo, Heine and
Scheurlin to music, hoping, by these means to slowly
introduce himself to the parisians. Again, his efforts
found no reward ; the public was accustomed to ex-
tremely light Italian compositions, compared to which
Wagner's songs were too heavy, and besides, in spite
of their resemblance to french music , were still too
full of Schubert, too full, generally, of a german spirit
In this always more prospectless battle after success,
the composer, who, in the entire french music-life,
found only true artistic pleasure in the conservatoire

—concerts, where Beethoven's symphonies were ear-
nestly cultivated , felt the desire to compose a sym-
phonic work (1840), of which but the first movement
was written, and which only, after (in the year 1855)
it had been greatly changed, was given to the public,
the so-called »Faust-ouverture<. Wagner intended
nothing less than to compose a regular ouverture to
Goethe's Faust-tragedy; he rather sought musically
to depict the faustical sufferings of a hero, who, weary

I of life , still in the consciousness of his own genial
power, again and again takes up the battle. The foun-
dation of his composition was the first movement of
the ninth symphony; Beethoven's Coriolan-ouverture
was also of decisive influence upon him.

The same despairing battle with the existing state
of art, which, insufficient and untenable as it was, threa-
tened to stifle the higher talent of the reformer in its
birth, made an author of Wagner. Since 1840, he
wrote, for the » Revue et gazette musicale<, and through!
Laube's recommendation for several german periodi-|
cals, critical reports on Paris musical and dramatic life,
several theoretical essays on the relations of the pro-
ductive to the reproductive artist, the artist to the
virtuosp- the genius to the public, on the manner of

21

german music, on the ouverture, on different symphonies
of Beethoven and Mozart, and finally two tales >Eine
Pilgerfahrt zu Beethoven* (»A pilgrimage to Beet-
hoven<) and »Ein Ende in Paris* (»An end in Paris*).
In the same manner, thirty years ago, E. T. A. Hoff-
mann, with the publication of articles on music and
of tales, had begun his career. A resemblance of
Wagner to Hoffmann becomes apparent in more
than one trait of these productions, most particularly
in his two tales. Before the young poet's eye, appeared
the form of the genial and, for this reason, unworldly
and misunderstood conductor Kreisler, when he re-
lated the story of the german musician, of his opinions
about art and his plans, of his pilgrimage to Vienna
to his adored ideal Beethoven, of his ineffectual
struggles and of his sad end in Paris. Different scenes of
these tales, capitally told, replete with wit, humour, irony
and satire, as well as with the most touching pathos,
remind one directly of Hoffmann's whimsical geniality.
But beside the old romantic narrator, the younger leaders
of the newest literature, amongst them principally Hein-
rich Heine, had begum to influence Wagner, parti-
cularly in the style of his critical essays. The author
Wagner, as well as Heine, found it to be his im-
perative duty to deride with biting scorn (what in later
years he alone found praiseworthy in Heine) the false-
ness of the entire culture and art. In all his works,
he sent up a cry of indignation against the modern
state of art, against the chase after enjoyment, the super-
ficiality of the public, which preferred to kill the time,
that hung heavily on its hands, with the sensual gra-
tification of eye and ear instead of seeking spiritual
elevation, against the authors' and composers' shallow
search for effect, whom not the impulse of the heart,
but a fashionable mania or the desire for gain drove
to art, against the virtuosity, through which singers and
actors destroyed the work of art, and degraded art
itself. As once in Strassburg, which, on the boundary

22

of Germany, was more and more estranging itself from
german manners, Goethe was forever won for german
literature, so Richard Wagner in Paris, the centre
of the romanic art, to which he had in latter years
adhered, returned forever to german music. For some
time, he was still under the delusion that also Meyer-
beer, to whom the ties of thankfulness held him, and
whose operas fascinated him by their theatrical effec-
tiveness and sometimes veritably dramatic construction;
was a true, and by nature essentially german artist.
His own artistic nature, however, had already soared
far beyond Meyerbeer's. He still loudly praised the
composer of »Robert« and the »Huguenots«, but, at
the same time, returned with warm admiration and
sacred enthusiasm to his old german masters, to Bach,
Gluck, Mozart, Beethoven, Weber, Marschner,
S p o h r , and sought theoretically as well as practically
to approach his future aim, a german drarnatic opera
after his own mind, a musical drama in the true sense
of the word. Two great steps in this direction were
taken in Paris; in the menth of November 1840 he
completed »Rienzi«, and in the following spring the
»Fliegende Hollander*.

More than three years had passed, since Bulwer's
novel «Rienzi, the last of the tribunes >, in the german
translation of Georg Nicolaus Barmann, had
fallen into his hands. Just at that period, the thought
of dramatically depicting a hero like Rienzi, a man full
of great projects, who perishes through the baseness
of his surroundings, might have greatly attracted him;
he himself may perhaps have felt a like impending
doom. For an opera, the subject with the entirely
lyrical element encompassing the hero, the lays, songs
and hymns with which Bulwer had interwoven his
work, seemed peculiarly fitting. On strictly dramatic
principles, Wagner created, for his own use, a text
for his « Rienzi » , but involuntarily accomodated his
work to the form of the five-act grand opera, the

23

completest and only form which, at that time, he could
conceive for the musical drama. The historical subject
most conveniently transmitted by Gibbon, Bulwer
had already lifted into the realm of poetry, and, by
these means, had brought it nearer to the hearts and
eyes of his contemporaries. Before him. Miss Mary
Russell Mitford had written a tragedy »Rienzi«,
which had been performed 1837, in London. Several
of its best motives, Bulwer had taken for his novel,
and in its preface, had spoken with the highest respect
of Miss Mitford 's work. After him, and directly be-
fore Wagner, Julius Mosen 1837 wrote a drama
> Cola Rienzi < , which, however, was of no influence upon
Wagner. Bulwer 's novel alone was the source
from which Wagner, however independently , drew ;
in the details — • wittingly or unwittingly — he coincided
with his english predecessor. Miss Russell Mitford.
What Bulwer, at that time already on the highest pin-
nacle of his fame, related with epic broadness, Wagner,
still a beginner in literature, was obliged to concentrate
to dramatic shortness and, at the same time, to heighten
its immediate effect. An exceedingly difficult task, only
to be accomplished, if the poet sacrificed the single
beauties of the work to his dramatic purposes. Wagner
.succeeded in this. He greatly diminished the number
of personages, concentrated, as much as possible, the
scene, the time and the action of his model, and in
the dramatic exposition of his work, excelled Bul-
wer by far. Herein, the entire firmness and greatness,
which in so high a measure characterized his most per-
fect creations, already became apparent. On the other
hand, in his desire for brevity, explanations of the mo-
tives sometimes suffered, and not at all times was he
able to endow his characters with individuality. The
execution often did not pay full justice to the grandeur
of the idea. The national element, although laid in
an ideal distance, into the Rome of the fourteenth
century, appeared in a significant light. Very naturally

24

resemblances in the principal ideas of »Rienzi« and
of the »Muette« arose. Externally, in words and in the
treatment of the scene, his opera now and then re-
minded of the » Huguenots*.

More dependent than the poet was the composer
of »Rienzi< upon Meyerbeer and Auber; but he
never sank to the level of a mere reproducer of these
masters. He learned from them, as he had learned
from Gluck, Mehul and Spontini. Direct resem-
blance to single parts of these masters' creations, he
sought to avoid; their style alone, he wished to imitate.
He strove always to be interesting, to avoid in every
bar what might seem trivial, and sought to make his
music correspond to the grandeur of his subject, and
the dramatic power of his poem. The influence, which
the modern grand opera still had upon him, only per-
mitted of his partially carrying out this idea. The
composer of »Rienzi« was not yet able to entirely free
himself from all conventionality or triviality; but the
poetical advantages of his text-book, particularly the
strong dramatic spirit that permeated the entire poem,
served to elevate his music: in contrast to Meyer-
beer, Wagner's instrumentation uniformly moved and
expressive , shows him to be the scholar of german
masters, who paid more attention tp rich polyphonistic
development, than to virtues vocal niceties after the
italian manner , or exaggerated orchestral subtleties.
In musical invention or melodic beauties, he could not
as yet compete with Meyerbeer or Auber; in the
earnestness and care which he devoted to his entire
composition, he already far exceeded both composers,
particularly Meyerbeer. In this spirit, and in truly
artistic manner, he especially treated the recitative;
in peculiarly individual manner, he continued to develop,
what Gluck's followers had taught him. From the old
fault of >Die Feen«, too great length in the musical
composition, unnecessary extensions or frequent repe-
titions of the same themes, >Rienzi« was not yet free.

25

In later years, Wagner himself regretted the vigorous
and noisy composition of the third act, which, coming
after the second, equally richly and energetically com-
posed, could not make the desired effect, but was
absolutely indispensable to the dramatic development
of the whole. The two last acts, completed in Paris,
give evidence' of the great artistic progress of the
composer; the characteristic repetition of certain mu-
sical motives already points to Wagner's future
treatment of his operas. The most important piece
of the score is the ouverture. Composed after the^^
completion of the entire opera in Paris, it depicts, in
a harmonious, dramatically animated tone-painting , the
contents of the first three acts, from the roman people's
struggle for liberty, to the decisive victories of Rienzi,
which are celebrated by the joyful songs of the delivered.
Here again, Weber and Beethoven, and the german
masters in general, were Wagner's models. What,
under this influence, he had, in his contemporary essay
on the ouverture, theoretically demanded, he now prac-
tically fulfilled; the ouverture to » Rienzi « and those
of his two following operas, may be considered as
perfected illustrations to this essay.

Several months after the completion of > Rienzi «,
in the spring of 1841, Wagner retired to the secluded
village of Meudon, in the vicinity of Paris. Here, in an
unspeakably short time, the »Fliegende Hollander«
(j-The flying Dutchman*), both musically and dramati-
cally, was created. Again, Wagner chose a subject,
which, for years already, had impressed itself upon him.
In Riga, he became acquainted with the legend of the
flying Dutchman. The fundamental elements of the
myths of Ulysses and the wandering jew, combined
with motives from the century of the great explorers,
were interwoven into a new mythical legend, which
Wagner found in Heine's >Memoiren des Herrn von
Schnabelewopski*. During the stormy sea-voyage from
Riga to London, the personages of Heine's tale gained

26

individual life in his imagination, and so, although he had,
for some time, still to work at his »Rienzi«, he drew
the plan for the new opera. The character of the hero,
the general course of the action , even some of the
principal scenes, Heine had already given; it was
therefore absolutely unnecessary for Wagner to seek
any further in older treatments of the same subject,
such as Captain Marryat's adventurous novel »The
phantom ship«. Instead, he borrowed from Wilhelm
Hauff's similar legendary tale of the phantom ship,
some traits, which served to characterize the ghastly
life on board of the condemned vessel. For the most
part he was obliged to newly create the character of
Senta, the woman, whose faithful love releases the sea-
man from his eternal wanderings. Only by these means,
was he able to change the epical tale, which Heine
related, into a real drama with tragical conflicts. For
this reason, he brought Erik, Senta's former lover, into
direct opposition to the Dutchman. This act reminded
somewhat of the relation of Clarchen to Brackenburg;-;
and Egmont; but with the «introduction of the rejected
lover into his piece, Goethe had hardly, as Wagner
has done, connected such important dramatic intentions.
As Senta's rejection of Erik gives the outward impulse
to the catastrophe, and lays the foundation to her tragi-
cal guilt, so, on the other hand, this withdrawal from sen-
sual love, which, together with the object of its choice,
seeks for the pleasures of life, leads to the pity free
of all sensuality, which irresistibly compells Senta to a
sacrificial death for the beloved. In many of his later
works as well, Wagner, similar to Beethoven in his
»Fidelio«, glorified the deeds of a woman, whose true
love releases an unfortunate or guilty man.

It was, for the most part, this idea that attracted
Wagner personally to the legend of the »Fliegende;
Hollander*. After his conception, the spirit of the music
was to be the expression of love. The deepest senti-
ments of the human heart were to be lovingly and warmly

27

expressed by this art, and by these means Wagner
intended to free the conventional grand opera of all the
cold artificiality and the formalities, only speculating on
outward effect, which characterized it. He himself ex^
perienced an artistic redemption of his genius, com-
parable to that, of which the poet let his Dutchman
partake. And in another sense, the longing of the
Dutchman after release from his everlasting wanderings
in the wide desolate world, found an echo in Wagner's
breast: he too longed for his fatherland; for it alone,
he created his new work.

As poet as well as composer, he commenced with
Senta's ballad. Before turning to anything else, he com-
pleted it. The dramatic and musical motives that the
ballad contained, only remained to be detached and
further developed. The entire opera received, by these
means, a ballad-like character; it appeared to be a
ballad soluted into dramatic action. Only a small number
of principal characters occupy our interest; the masterly
development of the action is distinguished by the strictest
unity; in one flow, in one day, without the least out-
ward interruption of the continuity of the action, it
unfolds itself; a harmonious spirit pervades the whole.
The want of individual character in some speeches,
particularly in those of the chorus, is a fault of which
Wagner accused himself, but which, in comparison to
the many good qualities of the work, can hardly be
considered.

Not less harmonious than the poem, is the musical
composition. In the opera, the different musical themes
of the ballad reappear again and again, at all points
where single sentiments, physical or spiritual occurrences,
already intimated in the ballad, are to be dramatically
developed. They serve to characterize situations, per-
sons and moods, and at the same time express, like
the principal themes of a sonata or symphony, the ar-
tistic unity of the opera, which otherwise threatens to i
dissolve into a number of single music-pieces. Already

28

Wagner's predecessors, Beethoven, Mozart and
other masters, particularly Weber, had, in the reoccur-
rence of the same expression of feeling in an opera,
repeated the same theme, and similar to them, Wagner
had proceeded in his former operas. He now much oftener
made use of these regularly returning so-called >Leit-
motive< (leading themes) and employed them — as he only
once before had done in his »Liebesverbot« — to charac-
terize the personages of his drama. From that time, the
development and perfection of these >Leitmotive<, their
aesthetic connection with one another, were, above all,
the musical foundation of his compositions. Far from
all pedantic schematism or mechanical calculation, he
always preserved his full artistic liberty and the free-
dom of creation, arising from an excited imagination
and a warm power of perception. In his »Hollander«,
he did not yet dare to break with the old opera form
with its arias, duets, trios and ensembles; in this com-
position, even the »Leitmotive<: were much more spar-
ingly used than in his later works. The transition from
the grand french-italian opera to a peculiarly german
musical drama, was often yet noticeable. The romanic
influence manifested itself principally in the concerted
vocal pieces, from the duet to the grand ensemble, in
whose melody, as well as harmony, much was yet
conventional and even trivial. On the other hand, the
^monologues and recitative, in particular, gave evidence
of independence of composition, and, like the german
folksong, sought to attain the greatest rhythmical /pre-
cision in the melodies. As Wagner had, in the german
folklore, found the poetical subject for his >Hollander«,
so, in his composition, it was the german folksong which,
above all, he strove to imitate in his »Leitmotive«.
From that time dates his resolve never to lose feeling
with the songs and the legends of his own people.
Like before in his »Rienzi«, his ouverture, which bore
the marks of greater ability, encompassed the contents
of the opera in a manner, which clearly and harmoni-

29

ously expressed the action of the whole, an ouverture
which in none of its parts denied the influence of Beet-
hoven and other german masters.

During the time in which Wagner had but con-
ceived the project of his >Hollander«, he vainly exerted
all his powers to bring about a performance of this
opera and of >Rienzi< in Paris. After the completion of
his work, he only offered it to german stages. At first
with but small success, until finally, at Meyerbeer's
recommendation, »Rienzi« was accepted at Dresden and
the >Fliegende Hollander* at Berlin. The artist could
now no longer endure to remain in a foreign country.
Various dramatic plans arose in his mind during the
last months he spent in Paris. Once again, lie planned
an historical opera >Die Saracenin* (»The saracenic
virgin*): in which an episode from the life of Man-
fred of Hohenstaufen , with many reminiscences of
Schiller's »Jungfrau von Orleans* and Immermann's
drama » Kaiser Friedrich II.«, was to be glorified. But
the old legends of Tannhauser, of the contest of poets
on the Wartburg, of Lohengrin, with which he now be-
came acquainted, at once took entire possession of his
imagination, and forever banished the forms of Manfred
and his saracenic half-sister. In his german home, he
intended to give these legends new dramatic life. In
April 1842, he left Paris and travelled through Thuringia,
passed the Wartburg to Dresden, there to hasten the
performance of his >Rienzi«.

I\'

$

aainly with a new artistic creation W a gner
took up his work at home : during a sum-
mer-trip to Bohemia , he completed , in
' TepHtz, the entire scenic plan of his »Tann-
hauser«. Then in Dresden, the rehearsals for
»Rienzi« commenced. They were the source of
the greatest joy to the poet-composer: musicians and
singers, amongst them Tichatschek, Wilhelmine
Schroder-Devrient and chorus-director Wilhelm
Fischer, from that time Wagner's faithful friend,
did all that energy and artistic power could do , to
effect a worthy representation of the new opera. With
the most decided success, the work was produced on
the 20"' of October 1842; already on the 2"^ of January
1843, the »Fliegende Hollander« followed, which, at
first, was received with a like approbation. More and
more, the attention of the public was drawn to the
young composer; Laube, at that time editor of the
»Zeitung fiir die elegante Welt«, begged his friend
for a short sketch of his life. In December 1842
Wagner sent him his witty, fresh and very warmly
written '» Autobiographical sketch*. Several weeks later,
he was appointed court-conductor of the orchestra in
Dresden. In this position, it was his duty to perform nu-
merous operas of the most dissimilar qualities ; however.

31

he always took occasion to reproduce, with the greatest
care and earnestness, and in the spirit in which they
had been conceived, the works of the older german
masters, such ag Gluck, Mozart, Beethoven,
Weber, Spohr and Marschner. In concerts, he
principally cultivated Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Cheru-
bini and Beethoven, for whose symphonies, parti-
cularly, he succeeded in arousing the interest of his
hearers. It is his merit to have awakened in Germany
the appreciation of the, until that time, calumniated
ninth symphony; through a programme especially written
for this purpose, he sought to make the mighty com-
position more comprehensible. He also undertook the
leadership of the »Liedertafel« in Dresden, and for this
society composed his >Liebesmahl der Apostel*
(»The love-feast of the apostles*, 1843). In the course
■of time, other compositions for particular occasions
appeared, above all the funeral march consisting of
different themes from »Euryanthe«, which Wagner
composed, when Weber's body was transported from
England to Dresden (1844), a transport, which" Wag-
ner's untiring efforts had chiefly been instrumental in
bringing about. But these small compositions for
especial occasions, disappear in their significance be-
sides the two dramatic works, which, during the years
spent in Dresden, the artist completed.

1- In the summer of 1843, he concluded the poetic
execution of his »Tannhauser« in Teplitz, the same
place in which, a year before, he had made the plan;
in the following months, until the spring of 1845, he,
with many interruptions and finally in nervous haste,
set his new work to music. Hitherto, Wagner had
always taken the subjects of his operas almost accurately
from an older drama or tale ; now, like a true poet, he,
for the first time, created the contents of his drama,
employing various traits from different legends, which
he originally, freely and boldly, but always artistically
combined to a new whole. The first incitement to his

32

>Tannhauser«, he doubtlessly received from Heine's
like-named legend (1836), whose conclusion dissolved,
unpoetically enough, into a political, literary satire upon
Germany. All the more, was the first canto of Heine's
poem able to give him a picture of the scene, in which
in the Venusberg the reveling knight, full of longing
for the hardships and tears of this world, and fearing
for the greatly imperilled salvation of his soul, tears
himself away from the goddess of love. A story of
Tieck's, about the trusty Eckart and Tannhauser,
which, years ago, Wagner had read, suddenly returned
to his mind. He looked it up, but felt himself more
repelled than attracted by its » mystically coquettish,
catholicly frivolous tendency*; nevertheless, several of
its details remained in his mind. Entirely different was
the impression which the original, sixteenth century
Tannhauser-ballad made upon him. Latterly, it had
several times been printed, particularly in Arnim's and
Brentano's collection >Des Knaben Wunderhorn< ; the
Grimm brothers in their » Deutsche Sagen* had also
related the contents of tlje ballad. Most probably,.
Wagner found it in the book, published 1835 by
Ludwig Bechstein, » Sagenschatz und Sagenkreise des
Thiiringer Landes*. In it he, at the same time, found
the information, that Tannhauser had intended to journey
to the landgrave Hermann of Thuringia, as the contest
of poets on the Wartburg was about to begin; but on
the way had been lured into the Horselberg by Venus.
This directed Wagner to another tale related by both
Grimms, and with which, in a different version, he
had in earlier years become acquainted, in E. T. A.
Hoffmann's tale »Der Kampf der Sanger*. Wagner
now read the real mediaeval poem of the »Wartburg-
krieg*, and in close connection a paper on the same
subject by C. T. L. Lucas, a professor at Konigs-
berg, who, amongst other things, expressed the scien-
tifically untenable conjecture, that Heinrich von Ofter-
dingen, the opponent of Wolfram von Eschenbach and

33

the other poets in the legendary contest, and Tann-
hauser are mythically identical. Wagner made use of
this idea and combined both legends to an organic
whole, which the title of his work >Tannhauser und
der Sangerkrieg auf Wartburg* (»Tannhauser and the
contest of poets on the Wartburg«) indicated. For the
dramatist, this could only be of advantage. By these
means, he gained, on the one hand, the necessary satis-
factory conclusion of the »'Wartburgkrieg«, which in
the mediaeval poem is wanting, and, on the other hand,
for the exposition and catastrophe of the legend of
Tannhauser, given by the old folksong, the dramatically
indispensible peripety. To be able still more signifi-
cantly and artistically to interweave the threads of the
poetic tissue, Wagner very happily adopted several
motives from Hoffmann's tale. Like this author, he
let Wolfram's adversary sing of the transcendant joys
of the Venusberg, and described Wolfram and Heinrich,
opponents in this contest, to otherwise be the warmest
of friends and at the same time rivals in their love
for the same lady. This lady he gave the name, the
holy purity and the unselfish meekness of St. Elizabeth,
whose history was already lightly connected with the
contest of poets, in the mediaeval poem, and, by
these means, gained for his drama a second female
character which, in its popular significance, is not in-
ferior to that of Venus, and whose poetical truth can
never be doubted upon, when we see Tannhauser re-
deemed, by her morally-religious spirit, from the power
of hell. The drama demanded a conclusion different
from that of the antipapistical ballad. In the former,
the wonder, revealing the mercy of God, must not
come too late for the redeemed to receive; Tannhauser's
death was at the same time to be his salvation from
the curse of sin. This may already have been the idea
of the original, from all tendencies unmarred folklegend.
By this alteration of the conclusion of the old ballad,
Wagner gained for the last scene of his drama a new

Muncker, Wagner, 3

3,4;

and important climax, which greatly served to heighten
fhe throughout masterly, and rich as well as life-like
development of the action. At the conclusion of the
piece, the battle of the heavenly and satanic powers
for Tannhauser's soul, gives the principal characters of
the drama occasion to reappear together in a charac-
teristically effective manner.

Again, as already in his former creations, Wagner
stood in an intimate personal relation to his poem. He
also bore the most fervent longing after the highest
spiritual-sensual enjoyment, which, however, the modern
world impossibly could offer him. Artistically he con-
strued this mood as the longing after a love redeeming
from sensuality, a love, not unearthly in its being, but
which, in its conflict with this world, arises to spiritual
sublimity. A fundamental idea, often to be repeated in
his later works, arose 'for the first time in his poesy.
He himself was, by this longing, transmitted into a state
of consuming sensual excitement, which kept his blood
and nerves in feverish agitation.

The musical composition, more than the words of
»Tannhauser«, gives evidence of this excitement. With
this composition, Wagner did not enter on new paths,
but continued more surely and independently to pursue
those he had taken in his » Hollander*. Sparingly still,
but already more richly and significantly than there,
he made use of the so-called »Leitmotive«. Now and
again, he introduced the old opera melody; but not
alone that it reappeared much more rarely than in the
^Hollander*, he now understood to greatly ennoble it.
Of the old opera form he retained but little. On the
other hand, the harmonious dramatic flow became more
than ever apparent in the music, and, together with it,

; Wagner's peculiar manner of composition, which never
denied its association with the true folksong, and with
a noble and significant declamation. The instrumentation.

,-was richer and more expressive than in any of his other
operas. Already in a much higher degree than in his

35

» Hollanders Wagner made his orchestra, together with
the vocal parts, the carrier of the melody.

After the completion of »Tannhauser«:, Wagner
went to Marienbad to spend the summer; filled with
productive power, he here wrote the complete plans
of two new creations, the »Meistersinger«: and » Lohen-
grin*. Returned to Dresden, he performed :Tann-
hauser« for the first time on the 19''' of Octobei: 1845.
The two first acts were very successful; but after the
over-long introduction to the third act and, in particular,
after the conclusion of the whole, the applause grew
fainter. Wagner recognized, that here niuch was
only indicated, which alone through the dramatic and'
theatrical elaboration could produce an effect. For this
reason, he not only shortened the introduction, which
too lengthily and broadly had represented Tannhauser's
pilgrimage to Rome, but also made the battle between
heaven and hell for Tannhauser's soul more life-like
and more convincing, by bringing Venus and the body
of Elizabeth, who formerly had both not appeared in
the last scene, again upon the stage. Still more im-
portantly he remodeled his work for its representation
at Paris, in March 1 861. To enliven the dramatic pro-
gress, he somewhat shortened the contest of poets in
the second act, and, in particular, almost entirely newly
composed the Venusberg-scene in the first act. The
ouverture, formerly, after the manner of his older ouver-
tures, an entirely independent tone-painting, he changed
into a simple introduction to the first act. To make
amends, he represented, in the Venusberg, the character
of the goddess of love and Tannhauser and their entire
parting scene dramatically and musically much more com-
pletely. The poetical and moral contents of this scene
he greatly deepened, by demonstrating in it, with the
highest artistic power, Schopenhauer's idea of the
negation of the will. Musically, especially by the in-
comparably richer means of his later manner of com-
position, he understood to reproduce the atmosphere of

3*

36

sultry sensuality, which lies over the Venusberg, in a
'masterly manner. Through the alterations and additions
of i860 and 1 86 1, the unity of style in his work ne-
cessarily suffered somewhat; however, through cleverly
contrived transitions, and through his ability to charac-
terize, Wagner prevented the contrast of the two
different styles from becoming disturbing. —

Of the two plans, which, in the summer of 1845,
had been created in Marienbad, the one, »Lbhengrin«,
Wagner carried out poetically the following winter,
and musically the year after. In Paris, together with the
legend of the contest on the Wartburg, he had become
acquainted with the mediaeval poem of a bavarian au-
thor, in which the history of Lohengrin, son of Parzival,
king of the Grail, and of his journey to Elsa of Brabant
is told, which Wolfram von Eschenbach at the close
of his greatest poem already related. At that time how-
ever, it had not incited Wagner to artistic creation.
Only later, when, through all the artificialities and ex-
aggerations of the poem, he recognized the simple po-
pular legend of Lohengrin,^ as perhaps the Grimm
brothers had related it in their » Deutsche Sagen<, he
felt himself more and more strongly attracted to the
subject. He now discovered, partly in the preface with
which Gorres had introduced his bavarian » Lohengrin*,
partly in other mediaeval sources, reminiscences from
like legends, which readily could be combined with
the most important moments of the old poem, to add
to the full dramatic development of the whole. In this
manner, he made use of some parts of Konrad von
Wiirzburg's >Schwanritter«, of the so-called >Younger
Titurel«, of the legend of Gottfried of Bouillon's an-
cestors, and of the old germanic belief, that, through
magic, human beings can be transformed into swans.
From the Euryanthe legend, with which he had be-
come familiar through Weber's opera, he borrowed
the principal traits for the character of his Ortrud and
her intriguing machinations against Elsa. To give the

37

inner antagonism of the wonaen occasion to visibly
break out in an important moment, he dramatically
imitated the conflict of the two queens before the
cathedral which occurs in the »Nibelungenlied«. Amongst
the newer poets it was Immermann, who, in his pro-
found work » Merlin*, had introduced the figure of
Lohengrin. His characterization of the knight of the
Grail, however, could in no manner have influenced
Wagner. Instead, the tragically terminating love-scene
between Merlin and Niniane in Immermann's drama,
may have served as model for the bridal-night-scene in
the third act of » Lohengrin*; a supposition which cer-
tainly is more probable, than that Wagner should
have used the celebrated duet in the fourth act of
the » Huguenots*, with which his love-scene has nothing
whatever in common. The resemblance between Elsa's
pantomimic play, when in the first act she appears be-
fore King Henry, and that of Fenella in Auber's re-
volutionary opera, is only very slight. The entire ordeal,
particularly Elsa's behaviour directly before it, reminds
one of the last scene in Marschner's »Templer und
Jiidin*.

Even if, however, in Wagner's work reminiscences
may be found, of what portent is this fact, when we
consider the completely original development of the
action, whose dramatic advantages the most ardent
opponents of the artist could not withhold from praising,
and the peculiar as well as artistic and profound charac-
teristic of the active personages.? In creating his Ortrud
a defender of suppressed heathenism, Wagner, besides,
gave his work an universally historic background, which,
through bringing the Lohengrin legend in combination
with the battles of Henry the fowler against the Hun-
garians, the mediaeval epic poet was by no means able
to reproduce in so significant a manner. Particularly
his conception of the symbolic contents of the legend,
whose eldest form he recognized in the myth of Jupiter
and Semele, was of the greatest depth. In it he found

■38

the nature of human longing expressed, which, may it
raise itself far above everything earthly, in the end
can only desire what is purely human, and, at the same
time, found in it the explanation of the true being of
love, which necessarily must desire entire sensible reality^
To gain love, entire full love, which in its truest form
is unalloyed by adoring admiration, the god-like being
descends unrecognized to an earthly woman. But the
splendour of his higher nature betrays him; the con-
fession of his divine origin is wrung from him, and,
unsatisfied in his craving for love, he returns to his
celestial solitude. With the same necessity however, with
which he, to gain love, must infold himself in a veil
of secrecy, the woman,, for her love's sake, must seek
to raise this veil. The unknown she can but admire;
only to him, whose entire being is laid open before
her, can she give her love. Not as a curious daughter
of Eve, does Elsa ask Lohengrin after his name and
race, but as the woman who seeks to gain the highest
love, even if its attainment must be paid with her own
destruction. For this reason', she becomes the tragical
heroine, the principal acting character of the drama;
what she does, becomes a tragic fault, as her action
is justified by its moral nature, but, at the same time,
violates an external law.

The new style, which in his last operas he had em-
ployed, Wagner in his »Lohengrin*, as poet as Well
as composer, led to a comparative perfection. He had
now entirely shaken off the old opera form; not a trace
of the detached voCal pieces was to be found, which
only had interrupted and detained the dramatic deve-
lopment. The old opera melody was forever banished;
even where the recitative seemed to turn into an arioso,
its melodies were principally, if not entirely, guided
by the consideration for the dramatic enhancement of
the declamation. Reminiscences, howe^ver faint, were
nowhere to be found. All the more clearly and de^
cidedly, the peculiar thematic tissue of the >Leit-

39

motive « spread itself out over the entire composition.
Entirely new appeared the treatment of the orchestra.
As in >Tannhauser<, the reproduction of independent
melodies was often alone intrusted to it. To gain
particular orchestral tone-effects, Wagner not only
employed, after an as yet unusual principle, the single
groups of the string.-, wood- and brass-instrunients dis-
connectedly or in part connectedly, but more often,
than had hitherto been done in his orchestra, applied
such instruments which before had been but seldomly
used for particular purposes.

A performance in Dresden of this work, Wagner
for the present could not bring about. In Weimar under
Franz Liszt's direction, on the 28* of August 1850,
»Lohengrin« was produced for the first time. Oiily
from afar, could the poet-composer enjoy the artistic
success of his drama; for years already, his fatherland
had closed its doors against him.

»-• Before Wagner had completed the composition of
» Lohengrin*, he felt himself attracted by two new drama-
tic subjects: the forms of Siegfried and of Emperor
Frederick Barbarossa arose before his creative
mind. When he contemplated the momentary political
position of Germany, he found the latter drama to "be
the fitter selection; for this reason, he wrote the entire
plan, which he intended to execute dramatically, but
not musically in the manner of the historical opera.
Soon however, he recognized, that the historical events
were too confining. To be able to entirely express
his poetic intentions, he would have been obHged either
to freely change the historical events, or to treat them
as a legend. What, by these means, was only to be
indirectly reached, could, through the artistic transfor-
mation of the myth, be much more readily attained.
Therefore Wagner gave up his historical drama, and in
a treatise »Die Wibelungen, Weltgeschichte aus derSage*
(»The Wibelungs, universal history out of the myth«^
1848) laid down the studies, which by this occasion he

40

had made. In conformation with two articles of the
philologist and historian Karl Wilhelm Gottling,
he sought to demonstrate, that the Wibelungs, or Ghibel-
lines, were one in name, race, nature and aspirations
with the Nibelungs, and that therefore Frederick Bar-
barossa in history, was identical with Siegfried in the
myth. To the hero of this myth, Wagner now ex-
clusively turned his creative power, and had soon exe-
cuted the general, in some of its parts already detailed
plan to a drama of the Nibelungs. The last part,
'Siegfrieds Tod* (>Siegfried's death*), he at once
wrote in the fall of 1848, as an independent tragedy.
For the time being, he tarried with the musical compo-
sition; the idea of another drama had taken possession
of him: at the same time, in fall 1848, he made ^he
plan for a »Jesus von Nazareth* in five acts.

Principally as artist, did he approach the holy hi-
story, whose scenic representation had, since the early
middle ages, again and again occupied the pious souls
of all natiojis. What they had never been able to suc-
ceed in, he, with superior poetical insight and power,
made possible, and pointed the way to: he sketched
a genuine, after all the rules of art constructed drama
of Christ's death, which should produce the highest
moral and poetically dramatic effect. To accomplish
this, Wagner divested the biblical subject from all the
supernaturally wonderful, which clothed it, conceived
Jesus to be the noblest of all human beings, who, in
a world of heartless power, founds the religion of love,
which, misunderstood by his people, he seals with his
death ; but at the same time, like a true dramatist, he
made use, in a masterly manner, of all historical per-
sons, which tradition has transmitted to us, above all
Barrabas, the circumstances of the Jewish people in
Jesus' time, their rebellious spirit against the Romans
who suppressed them, and the sect- and party-spirit
amongst them. Poetically he newly and effectively dis-
posed the incidents in Jesus' life, and with great art

41

deepened the spiritual characters of Christ's opponents
and followers. The religious dogma, the bold dramatist
certainly did not leave untouched; but all the more
grandly did he glorify the moral idea of Christiani ty,
whose victory arises from the physical sacrifice of its
founder. The instructive-philosophical element , whose
expansion it would have been difficult to confine, would,
even in a spoken drama — for, of a musical compo-
sition it was impossible for Wagner to think — greatly
have threatened to check the course of the action.
Before, however, the poet could try his skill in evading
these perils, he entirely gave up his plan. He recog-
nized that, with this transformation of a dogmatic,
strictly limited subject, he could at present, by no
means, gain entry upon the stages. But only so long as
the revolutionary spirit, which had also incited him to
this work, permeated the people, could the production
of his drama have any value for him.

Into the sphere of art Wagner principally wished to
conduct this spirit, to awaken the new and to do- away
with old, unnecessary Customs. Far from the narrow ex-
treme party-strifes, he executed, for the saxon minister
of public worship, the plan for the organization of a
german national-theatre for the kingdom of Saxony.
He wished to elevate the cultivation of art and, through
it again, the morals of the people. For this purpose,
he desired to change the theatre, hitherto dependent
on the court, into a national institute, which in purely
artistic questions was to be advised by all its pro-
ductive and reproductive artists, and finally provided
with a school to educate a younger generation for
the theatre, opera and orchestra. Before the saxon
ministry had found time to sufficiently examine this
plan, the life of its author had taken an entirely new
course. In the revolutionary disturbance, which, parti-
cularly since the spring of 1848, had, in the other
parts of Germany and also in Saxony, steadily increa-
sed, Wagner had taken part, not as an ultra, not

42

even as a decided or consistent republican, but still
enough, to fear severe punishment after the overhur^
ried may-insurrection in Dresden 1 849 had been for-
cibly quelled by the prussian troops. Before the judi-
cial prosecution could be opened against hiro, he had
forever fled from Dresden, passingly happy in the sen-
sation of his newly regained complete artistic liberty,
in spite of the bitter experiences which the latter
days had brought him.

psfe^'J-.'v '. ■■'■t»S^S£«>-%^

evt many trials and perplexities, Wagner
was yet to experience a great and un-
expected joy before leaving Germany for
many years , a joy which gave him. courage and
strength to bear all the misery, which yet might assail
the man as well as the artist. During a short visit to
"Weimar, he gained the friendship of Franz Liszt.
In former years, but always transiently, 'he had met
the celebrated artist, who, but lately, had renounced his
career as virtuoso and had retired as court-conductor of
the orchestra to the thuringian capital. In latter years
he had, more than any other living musician, evinced
'^he h^hest interest in Wagner's artistic creation: for
%Tannhauser« he gained new ground in Weimar. To
him the exiled man first fied. In him, he found an
artist who understood him, a highminded man, who,
in undimmed nobility of feeling, trusted and loved him
with a faithful heart. His scores , his most precious
possessions, Wagner entrusted to him. From now
on, he sought from him advice and help in all per-
plexities, and never sought in vain. Both artists were
well aware of the great dissimilarity of their natures,
as well as of the disparity of their lives, their education
and their intellectual development. In a letter to Liszt,
Wagner once emphasized his particular artistic aversion
to the french language and remarked explanatorily: »You
will not be able to understand that ; but you are a
european man of the world, whereas I was born quite
especially germanic.« However, as soon as it was

44

necessary to do one another acts of friendship, these
disparities vanished. Firstly for Liszt, and then for
the few friends whom Liszt 'principally had gained
for him, Wagner now wrote and composed; Liszt
however, made it a point of honour and a new object
of his life, to produce these creations in a manner which
worthily fulfilled the intentions of their author, and by
these means, to work in a true artistic spirit' for
their propagation and comprehension.

From Weimar, Wagner at first turned his steps to
Paris, but the entire life in that city thoroughly filled
him with repugnance, and he thereft)re, in July 1849,
went to Zurich. Here, after his wife had joined him, he
settled down. Exiled from Germany, pursued with a
warrant of arrest by the saxon magistrate , he lived
fully nine years in Zurich. Once again, the wish to
bring one of his works on the Paris stage, drove him,
in 1850, back to the french capital, and three years
later, during a recreation-trip, which he had undertaken
.with Liszt, he again came to that city. But from Paris,
as well as from different swiss watering-places, which
he had visited during the summer months, he always
gladly returned home to Zurich.

Amongst his new fellow-citizens he gained many
a friend; besides him, other Germans of intellectual
importance and artistic aspirations had in Zurich found
a refuge. With the germanist Ludwig Ettmiiller
and with Georg Herwegh, later with Gottfried
Semper and Gottfried Keller, he often associated.
In the theatrical and musical life of Zurich he took
active part. The comprehension of Beethoven's sym-
phonies and ouvertures he sought to awaken, by carefully
prepared performances and explanatory programmes.
With the exception of the »Fliegende Hollander*, he
could bring none of his works upon the Zurich stage;
but in May 1853, with the assistance of friends, musicians,
who had hastened from all parts of Switzerland and
from Germany at his call, he was permitted the joy

45

of performing, in three successive concerts, selections
from »Rienzi*, the >Hollander< , ^Tannhauser* and
»Lohengrin«, before an enthusiastic audience. Younger
followers, old friends and other guests assembled in
Zurich for this festival. Visitors from home, the exiled
man was not wanting in, either before or afterwards.
But how little could this add to the amelioration of
his grief in being excluded from his fatherland, from
. Liszt, the friend who alone understood him, and in
being irrevocably forced to shun Weimar, the only
place in which his creations really artistically lived!
Always more and more violently he was seized by the
longing, at least to see his »Lohengrin« only once,
upon the stage. The idea that this wish was for so
long a time denied him, together with the bitterness
with which he felt his artistic isolation, wasted his
health like a slow poison, and sometimes even para-
lized the zeal and energy, with which he had begun
new artistic creations.

When he had first come to Zurich in 1849, he
had felt the desire to theoretically express, as thoroughly
and clearly as possible, what, in opposition to the
ruling so-called art of those days, he stfove to attain
for his people. Before all, he wished to protest again~st
the assertion, that the subduers of the revolution were
the protectors of art. Still greatly excited by the re-
cent experiences, he wrote, in a manner which through-'
out gives evidence of the passionate enthusiasm of its
author, his first reformatory article »Die Kunst und
die Revolution* (»Art and revolution*, 1849). In
the germ, it already for the^ most part contained,
what his later art-essays more accurately developed.
Very decidedly Wagner denied, that the revolution
had been detrimental to the true art, similar to that,
which the ancient Greeks, as handsome, strong and
free men, had cultivated in their highest work of art,
in the attic tragedy. With the fall of free greekdom
this art had degenerated and had, in the service of

46

the Church, the sovereigns and finally of industry, more
and more become a mere artistic trade, which no longer
served for the intellectual elevation of the entire people
but was dedicated to the sensual gratification of some
few, just as it no longer owed its existence to a ne-
cessity of the people, but to a fashion, a caprice of
luxury. The true drama, which combines music, poetry
and the sister arts, is, without the least common artistic
support or aim, dissolved into plays and operas, into
decorations, ballets, declamation, vocal music and or-
chestra. Only when, through the revolution, the entire
people have risen to perfect liberty, and, in the true
comprehension of the teachings of Jesus, have shaken
off, and completely and in every form eradicated the
slavery, which was chiefly instrumental in bringing J
about the fall of the old greek world, only then, can'
real art and, with it, its most perfect creation, the true
drama, be regenerated, as the highest intellectual pro-
duction of the common national life, for whose merited
cultivation and general accessibility the state must care.
What Wagner here had given, predominatingly in
the spirit of negative criticism, he demonstrated in a more
detailed manner in the; books written in the following two
years »Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft* (»The work of
art of the future*, 1850), >Kunst und Klima*, (»Art
and climate*, 1850), and »Oper und Drama (»Opera
and drama*, 185 1), and supplemented it with positive
propositions as to the manner in which the true dra-
matic art could, from its decay, be awakened to a new
and higher life. Systematically he examined, in what
manner all the arts, plastic, mimic, phonetic and oral,
had in the antique tragedy combined to the highest
mutual purposes, and how thereafter, released from
this close and life-like union, the single arts had in
1 their individual development either stagnated or de-
' generated. He refused to acknowledge the objections,
that only the mild atmosphere of Greece had been
able to ripen the artistic power of intuition and for-

47

ination, out of which the attic tragedy had grown.
Only the historical man, the man independent of nature,
has awakened art to life ; and only he, noble and strong,
who through the highest power of love has attained
true liberty, can newly create the vanished dramatic
work of art, just as he alone, his life and death, is
its subject ; for this reason, there can only be one prin-
cipal consideration for art, and that is the true nature
of the human race. Strictly Wagner weighed the
unsuccessful attempts of the last century, to externally
combine the sister arts (without any of them giving up
their egotistic purposes) in the oratorium and, parti-
cularly, in the opera, the trysting place of their most
selfish endeavors. He contrasted, with these inorganic
species, the loving union of the single arts in the work
of art of the future, in the true drama, that, like the
attic tragedy, employed the same artistic means, only
on a greater scale and with a higher technical per-
fection, in the same manner and for the same purposes.
Like the attic tragedy, it is to be represented by the
people, or rather, the totality of different artists is to
represent it for the people; just however, as the single
arts can here for the first time freely and naturally
unfold their innermost nature, so the individuality of
the single artist can, just in that community with the
whole, significantly develop itself.

To Hegel's philosophy and, particularly, to the
works of Hegel's, follower, Ludwig Feuerbach,
Wagner owed, besides several speculative views, the
stylistic schooling, which, in the strictly logical con-
struction of his work of art of the future, he had pre-
served. The idea itself was solely his, the intellectual
inheritance transmitted to him by the greatest thinkers
and poets of Germany and of the neighboring countries,
for more than a century, an idea which had been latterly
reawakened by the glorification of the greek drama as
the festive reunion of all arts, in Anselm Feuerbach's
book on the Apollo of the Vatican.

48

"With the unavoidable partiality of the reformer,
Wagner set up his ideal of the drama. By no means
did he wish, in demanding a combined work of art, to
dispute the right of existence and the merits of the
individual arts ; he only denied the possibility of attaining,
through them smgly, the true drama, which was com-
parable to the antique tragedy. In his universal artistic
talents, the poetical and musical endowment predominated;
the separate development of the poetical and musical
arts, and the parts which both arts were to play in
the drama of the future, he therefore examined with
the most care and with the most correct judgement.
Against some particulars in the historical appraisement,
objections may now and again be raised; examined as
to its aesthetic contents, we find the statement of the
whole unapproachable. Whoever, with unprejudiced
eyes, reads Wagner's art-essays, with the simple and
honest desire for instruction, will find in them an asto-
nishing fill of new information, and sharp, striking
remarks on the nature of music , the language and
poetic art, the myth, novels and the drama, on the
historical development of the opera and the play
and the most prominent masters in both arts, on the
manifold attempts to widen the musical modes of ex-
pression in> general, and to fill them with contents of
greater value, on the tasks of the chorus and orchestra,
on poetical speech, versification and the formation of
the rhyme, on the relation of the drama to politics
and religion, to the purely human individual and to
the people. In spite of all the philosophic- aesthetic and
historical knowledge, which in these works of Wagner
reveals itself with imposing grandeur, in spite of the,
sometimes pedantically scrupulous, logical construction
of single thoughts, which often tends to make his reading
difficult, it was still only possible for an artist, who
solely as artist investigated and thought, to write
these . essays. Principally for the artist and only in the
second place for the scientific thinker, had th^y been

%

49

written. To the latter also they had much to offer ;
but even more than the artists, did the men of science
ignore the suggestions which Wagner gave — to their
own detriment. Many a goal, which the newer aesthe-
tics, independently of him, had with double labour and
only indirectly neared, he had, at that time already, com-
pletely and by the straightest route attained, and had
smoothed the paths for those who chose to follow him.
A number of smaller treatises and essays, 1849
— 1851, follow Wagner's fundamental theoretical works,
So a letter to Liszt about the »Goethestiftung«, »Er-
innerungen an Spontini« (» Reminiscences of Spon-
tini«), propositions for a theatre in Zurich, hints and
counsels for the performance of »Tannhauser« and
the »Hollander«, thoughts about the duties of musical
criticism in the true sense of the word, a report of his
composition of a new conclusion to the ouverture of
Gluck's »Iphigenia in Aulis«, and many others. Often
again, he trod the paths, which his large reformatory
works had taken ; occasionally, he sought the courses
which he already had pursued in his plan for a german
national-theatre in Saxony. Amongst these articles, a
larger essay created the greatest sensation, which ap-
peared, in September 1850, in Franz Brendel's »Neue
Zeitschrift fiir Musik«, under the title »Das Juden-
tum in der Musik* (»Judaism in music*), and was
republished, in 1869, and sharpened by acrid additions.
What, in this article, was said about Jewish poets and
composers, especially about Mendelssohn-Bartholdy
and Meyerbeer, might, at that time, have often seemed
severe, but, in the present day, can hardly be earnestly
gainsaid by impartial judges of the newer development
of our music. Contestable is only the general funda-
mental idea of the essay, that the jew, through his
nature, is necessarily incapable of artistic creation.
Wagner's mistake, which, in some details, gave rise
to several incorrect remarks, is historically explainable
by the national spirit, which, since the time of the

Muncker, Wagner. 4

50

romanticists, in contrast to the cosmopolitical endeavor
of the last century, permeated the entire german lite-
rature. By right, his judgement only is applicable to
the jew of the transition period, who wished to enjoy
the privileges of emancipation, and still could not be-
come accustomed to entirely consider himself a member
of the nation, to which he now nominally belonged.
When he wrote his essay, Wagner was far from
the intention of giving great offence; with the foolish,
as well as immoral agitations against the jews by the
agitators of our days, he had nothing in common. In
its contents of much greater importance than the, by
Wagner's opponents unmeritedly exaggerated essay
on the jews, was an article, which, for a long time, had
been hardly noticed, and which, in 1851, had accom-
panied the edition of his last three dramas, under the
title >Eine Mitteilung an meine Freunde< (»A
communication to my friends*). It contained, above
all, the deeply impressive history of the artistic course
of development which he himself had hitherto taken,
and for this reason served^ as an excellent explanatory
supplement to his »Oper und Drama*, as well as an
aesthetic preface to the large composition »Der Ring
des Nibelungen« (>The ring of the Nibelung*), whose
appearance Wagner announced at the conclusion of
his essay.

In latter years, the formerly so actively creative
artist had almost exclusively devoted himself to writing
essays on art. Not a philosophical, but an artistic
impulse led him. To prepare the ground for the
future drama, whose plan he carried in his mind, he
was obliged to first theoretically explain what his in-
tensions were with this drama. Now, that this was
accomplished, he felt himself again mightily impelled
to musical and poetical production. Since, in the year
1848, he had written the tragedy »Siegfrieds Tod«,
• the picture of this greatest of germanic heroes stood
visibly and temptingly before his eyes. Only transitorily,

51

was the lustre of this apparition darkened by another
similar mythical figure ; with the intention (which was
soon abandoned) of setting his work to music, Wagner,
at the close of the year 1849 and beginning of 1850,
wrote a drama in three acts »'Wieland der Schmied*
(»Wieland the smith*). Already in 1835, Karl Sim-
rock, founding on the old northern tradition, trans-
mitted to us by the »Edda« and by the »Wilkinasaga<:,
celebrated , in a long-drawn heroic poem of strong
archaistic coloring, the deeds of the germanic Daedalos,
who, in the utmost extremity, forges himself a pair of
wings, to take revenge upon his enemies. This poem
and the northern sources gave Wagner his subject,
but not only was he obliged to concentrate the epically
loosely woven incidents , but also to morally ennoble
different traits of the legend, to be able to form a
drama which would serve to express all his artistic
ideas. The myth of Wieland, Wagner conceived
principally as the symbolical representation of true art,
which, enslaved by the rudest power, and forced to
serve inartistic purposes, in deepest suffering rises to
the greatest height of its miraculous strength , and '
regains freedom and splendour with the destruction of
the suppressing powers.

Notwithstanding the success, with which Wagner
understood to dramatically form and poetically deepen
the epic subject, the new sketch soon give way before
the old plan. The same sources which had given him
his Wieland legend, pointed the way back to his Sieg-
fried tragedy. When, however, in the spring 1851, he
commenced setting his tragedy to music, he recognized
that, in his work, he had in epic form intimated nume-
rous, indispensable allusions to Siegfried's and Brunhilde's
former history, which only then could be really artisti-
cally effective, if they themselves were dramatized.
This emergency he met in a quickly written three-act
drama »Der junge Siegfried* (»Young Siegfried*). Here
however, he made the same experience, and so, in the

4*

52

course of the year 1851, decided to let his »Junge Sieg-
fried* be preceded by two other dramas, an extensive
preliminary piece, which was to represent the rob of the
Rheingold, with the immediate consequences following
the theft, and a further tragedy in three acts, which was
to be devoted to the destiny of Siegfried's parents, and
to the separation of the Walkure Briinhilde from Wotan,
which is closely interwoven with it. The latter drama
was completed on the i'" of July 1852, the former in
November of the same year. The connection of the
four dramas was not merely outward; together they
formed a single great tragedy, in which, through com-
mon guilt and common expiation, the destinies of gods
and men are closely linked. Siegfried's destiny sym-
bolized the fate of humanity; with his death, perishes
the race of the gods. In conformation to this idea,
Wagner combined the legends of the Nibelungenhort
and its most splendid possessor Siegfried, with that
of the »G6tterdammerung«, of the fall of the gods,
who, in battle with the giants and dwarfs, have com-
mitted themselves by wroi^g doing, and through their
association with Loge, the spirit of negation, have
undermined their own existence. This, and the circum-
stance, that single motives of »Siegfrieds Tod* had
been anticipated in the preceding pieces, necessitated
a thorough reformation of the concluding drama. The
last weeks of the year 1852, Wagner devoted to
this purpose, and at once had the whole printed, at
first solely for friends, in 1863 for the entire reading
world, under the title: »Der Ring des Nibelungens
a »Biihnenfestspiel«, consisting of the dramas »Das
Rheingold*, »Die Walkiire*, »Siegfried« and
»Gotterdammerung*.

With the commencement of the composition, Wagner
tarried no longer. Already during the period of poetical
creation, directly after its completion, and whilst Wagner
was on a journey to upper Italy in the summer i8S3i
single musical themes of the new work had been com-

S3

posed. The following winter, Wagner went about the
systematic composition of the »Rheingold«; already in
May 1854, it was completed. Until the commencement
of the year 1856, the music to the »Walkure« was
executed with a like vigorous energy. Much more
difficult after this permanent exertion, seemed the work
for » Siegfried «. About one and a half acts were com-
posed until June 1857; then the entire hopelessness
of his endeavors, decided him to lay aside for a while
the work , for which he could not even hope to find
a publisher. Only eight years later, he could again
take up its composition and, with many interruptions,
bring it to a conclusion. At the beginning of the year
1869 he completed the composition of >Siegfried«, in
November 1874 that of the »Gotterdammerung«. It
had required more than a quarter of a century for the
artistic idea, to gain its perfect poetical-musical form.
The poetical merit of Wagner's >Nibelungen«
consists, above all, in the fact, that here, for the first
and only time in our entire literature, an artist, en-
dowed with the highest dramatic qualities, treated the
grandest subject of germanic folklegend after the oldest
traditions, which alone have preserved, in unsullied
purity, the tragical contents and the moral significance
of this myth, which originally depicted the events of
nature. Instead of using, like Geibel, Hebbel and all
the other authors, who, in a dramatically unsatisfying
manner , treated the Siegfried myth, the middle-high-
german »Nibelungenlied«, of which Friedrich Theodor
Vischer in his suggestions for a Nibelurigen-opera 1844
had at first thought, Wagner drew from the old nor-
thern sources, from the songs of the »Edda«, which
he found in Ettmiiller's translation, and particularly
from the »Volsungasaga« , which, already in 181 5,
Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen in the fourth
volume of his »Altnordische Heldenromane* , had
rendered into german. In the same collection, the
»Wilkinasaga«; and »N6rnagestssaga« had been trans-

54

lated, which, with some deviations in the details from
the other accounts, also related the adventures of Sieg-
fried. Particularly from the »Wilk:inasaga«, of which
Simrock already had taken several deeds of Sieg-
fried for his >Wieland«, Wagner appropriated different
ideas. Simrock himself, and amongst the newer poets
at the most Fouque, who, in his » Sigurd der Schlangen-
toter«, had also drawn fron the northern legends, were
able now and again to give him unimportant suggestions.
Several inferior traits he took from german popular
tales and other national traditions. Above all, he sought
to free the different northern versions of the legend
from all later additions, as well as from all ingredients,
which might artistically prove to be impediments, and
to evolve the simple, original form of the myth, which
was most fit for poetical revivification. For this pur-
pose, he read, partly advised by Ettmiiller, several
scientific essays, which Wilhelm Grimm, Lachmann
and other germanists had written about the Nibelungs.
Amongst them, besides Ettmiiller's preface to his
»Edda« translation (1837); Wilhelm Miiller's »Ver-
such einer mythologischen Erklarung der Nibelungen-
sage« (1841) seems to have made the deepest impression
upon him.

Through these studies, he acquired Lachmann's
opinion, that the original myth of the Nibelungs ended
with Siegfried's death. His attention was particularly
led to the double form in which the same legendary
motives sometimes appeared, and which, as dramatist,
he must simplify. What, after this cleansing process,
remained as the germ of the old legend and foundation
for the new drama, he sought more closely to combine
in the individual parts, to poetically substantiate more
significantly, and to enrich with modern philosophical
ideas. By these means, as in the acception of the
original myth, Wagner identified his Siegfried with
Baldur, the god of spring, whose death brings about
the end of the world. He greatly deepened the contrast

55

between the desire for power and gain, -which is the
source of all guilt and therefore the principal instrument
in bringing about the world's end, and the unselfish,
sacrificial love, which alone can redeem the world from
sin to salvation. As principal dramatic idea, he deve-
loped the battles of the luminous god of heaven, Wotan,
with the gloomy Nibelung Alberich, and by these means,
organically combined the legend of the Wolsungs (re-
duced to its principal events) with the legend of Wotan.
To save the world from Alberich's ignominious sway,
Wotan begets a son Siegmund, who is to combat with
the foe, whom the god, bound by treaties, may not
battle against. But he must recognize, that his son
cannot act independently from him, that, through
Siegmund, he himself would fell the forbidden blow,
and so , with Siegmund , he gives up his desire for
dominion, for life and for action. No longer active,
only observant, he roves as wanderer through the world,
harassed by the one care, that the end of the gods,
which he now desires, shall not serve to make Alberich
ruler. Quite independently, outwardly even in direct
opposition to Wotan, Siegfried, Siegmund's son, is the
first to act. In combat, he obtains the ring of the
Nibelung, to which the rule of the world is attached.
A new stage in the strife of the light and dark powers
now arises, the battle between Siegfried and Alberich's
son. Unknowingly, Siegfried is ensnared by the latter
into the commitment of a wrong, and the curse of the
ring attains him ; with him falls Briinhilde, who selfishly
values her own love-happiness more than the gods or
the world. With death alone all errors cease; dying,
and together with her death confirming the downfall
of the gods, she accomplishes the redeeming act of
love, which forever breaks the curse.

To an outward symbol, to the ring which Alberich
forges from the Rheingold, Wagner knit the entire
tragic conflict of the powers of the upper and lower
world. But how well did he understand to deepen

56

the significance of this symbol, to heighten its terrors
through the double curse, with which it is made and
stolen from its first possessor, and through its being
the constant object of general desire, to make it, in
reality, the centre-point of the entire work ! How readily
did he understand to artistically make use of the ring's
fatalistic power, without for a moment turning his steps
into the unpoetic paths of the fatalistic tragedy ! With
what care did he, above all, seek to evolve the dramatic
action out of the characters ! At all points, his psycho-
logical development displayed the highest degree of art,
in those parts of the tetralogy, where the gods are the
bearers of the action, not less than in those, where
the dramatic development is solely effectuated by human
beings. For the gods, the limits of space, time and
natural strength , ' set to human beings , do not exist.
But the same moral idea of right and wrong, of guilt
~,and expiation is given to them ; they experience the
like emotions of the soul; they are therefore exposed
to the same tragic fate. The tragical culmination-point
is reached in Briinhilde, the principal dramatic character
of the »Gotterdammerung«, who belongs equally to
gods and men. The highest tragical conflict known to
life and art agitates her soul ; her love for the adored
man forces her, with entire and clear forethought to
kill • him , that their mutual love may remain pure and
unsullied. Not alone is the highest point of the tragi-
cal development in the »Nibelungen« denoted by the
»G6tterdammerung«, it is at the same time masterly
in its dramatic exposition, and faultless in its unity.
A similar unity, it was not possible to give to the,
preceding pieces. In them, everything points to the'
future; at the conclusion of each of them, questions
necessarily must be left open, and new threads be spun
to the action. An outward unity of action, in the con-
ventional acceptation of the term, it was not possible to
attain. These first parts of the tetralogy are also rich
in tragic contents, and are carried out with great dra-

57

matic art. But the epical and lyrical elements required
a large scope in these dramas, and in consideration for
truly artistic effect, it was necessary, that the cheerful
.idyll sSiegfried*, entirely bare of tragical conflicts, this,
simple woodland piece, with its youthfully dauntless
solitude, as Wagner himself called it, be inserted be-
tween the excitingly touching tragedies »Die Walkure«
and »Gotterdammerung«.

Not less than in the disposition of the whole, did
the dramatic superiority of the poet prove itself in the
execution of the details. Everywhere, even when only
narratives were to be brought in, or lyrical sentiments
to be depicted, he understood, at least to awaken a
dramatic impression, which helped to pass over the
artistically doubtful but unavoidable scenes , in which
the outward action comes to a standstill. The inner
development progresses unceasingly. The dramatic con-
tinuation of the whole is visibly promoted by the strictly
limited unity of time in the single pieces, each of which
comprises only one, or few successive days. Combined
with this is the dialogue , which indefatigably presses
onward, and which sometimes unites the most concise
brevity, with the highest vigor of expression. With the
same boldness as, at former epochs of our literature,
Klopstock, Wieland, Goethe and single romantic
authors, Wagner awakened the forms and words of
our old poetical expression to new life. The »Nibe-
lungen* exceed, in poetic splendour and wealth, by far
all that Wagner, until that time, had written. From
germanic antiquity he also derived the alliterative form,
which he renewed (without regard for the supposed
rules of old-german metric, which are still the object
of discussion) freely and originally, and therefore with
the greatest artistic success.

In the musical composition of his »Nibelungen«,
Wagner took the last decisive step on the path, which
had led him from the ^Hollander* to »Lohengrin«. An
entirely dramatic music, the goal which, from creation

58

to creation, he had neared, was now reached. Every
resemblance to the old opera form, be it ever so slight,
had vanished ; consideration for the drama alone existed.
Ceaselessly, the richest vocal-melodies flowed through,
the entire composition, which, in a higher degree, com-
bined the advantages of the former recitative and aria.
Throughout, the melodies were inspired by the natural,
popular rhythm ; in general, there resounded from the
vocal parts a declamation of the poetic word, greatly
ennobled by the highest means of art. Like in the real
drama, speech and response alternated regularly; con-
certed pieces or, above all, choruses were very seldomly
inserted, only when the dramatic situation naturally ad-
mitted of them. Then however, they did not, like in the
conventional opera, serve merely for the quantitative
augmentation of the tones, so that, instead of onfe artist,
several break into the same words and syllables in ex-
actly the same division of the bar; Wagner's ensembles
and choruses were divided into single parts, which,
although unitedly sung, still were each of them in-
dependently treated. The place of the former concerted
vocal pieces the orchestra now filled, which unfolded
a hitherto unknown polyphonistic wealth, and which, in
melodic as well as harmonic respect, was carried out
with equal prodigality and boldness. It was its task, to
explain and interpret the dramatic action, occasionally
to prepare for it, and to unite for our perception,
what time and place had separated, or what seemed
too disconnected for logical comprehension. Here again,
Wagner threw off all conventionality. He replaced,
for example, the former ouverture, in itself an inde-
pendent whole, by a proportionately short instrumental
introduction, which prepared for the impressions of the
first scene, and he allowed himself occasionally the
liberty of employing entirely realistic tone-effects, which,
certainly, never violated the rules of the beautiful and
of art. Over the vocal and instrumental whole, the
web of the so-called » Leitmotive « spread itself, now no

59

longer (as in »Lohengrin«) only in the principal themes,
but carried out, as fully as artistically, even in the mi-
nutest and slightest detail. From the grand funda-
mental themes, which all four dramas had in common,
he derived numerous secondary themes, so that the
principal motives, extremely simple in themselves, but
capable of further development, returned again and
again in ever new and skillful transfigurations, which
still were similar in tone.

The musical composition, as well as the poetic
execution of the »Nibelungen«, corresponded fully with
the theory, which Wagner had developed in his re-
formatory articles. At the time, in which he wrote
them, he already carried the ideal in his mind, which
as productive artist he had now accomplished, and for
this reason could, at that time, only teach what harmo-
nized with his, for the present only mentally conceived
ideal.

Whilst Wagner was vigorously working at his
»Nibelungen«, his older compositions had, from Weimar,
conquered admittance on all german stages. After long
years, he at last could again hear his >Tannhauser«,
which, in February 1855, made its triumphant entry in
Zurich. Immediately after this performance, Wagner
followed a call of the older philharmonic society in
London, to lead eight of its concerts. During four
months, rich in excitement and sorrow, he slowly, and
in constant battle with an illnatured and short-sighted
critic and inartistic but carefully fostered habits, gained
the love of the musicians amongst whom his duties
lay, and the approbation of the public. At the same
time, he acquired a friendly appreciation for Hector
Berlioz, who was stopping, for similar purposes as he,
in London. Illness and mental troubles, which, however,
did not suppress his creative impulses, embittered the
following winter.

Of musical creations, which had newly arisen be-
side his, the symphonic compositions of Liszt alone

6o

could awaken his entire sympathy. Particularly, after
his friend had, during his visit in the autumn of 1856,
himself produced them before him, "Wagner felt the
necessity of making his opinion of them publicly known.
In a witty, with humor and irony impregnated letter,
(which was printed several times) he, without entering
into the particulars of the musical contents, the strength
of the thematic inventions, the harmonic execution,
above all declaimed against the objections which were
raised against the new artistic form of those compo-
sitions.

In the mean time, new artistic ideas, in connection
with new philosophical studies, had arisen in Wagner's
soul. As soon as, under the bitter corripulsion of his
outward position, he was forced, for a time to hope-
lessly lay aside the task of his life, the »Nibelungen«,
he turned to those new ideas, which impelled him to
immediate, poetically musical creation.

i^?

W,'

|mce the year 1854, Wagner, with steadily
' increasing zeal, devoted himself to the study
^.y of Arthur Schopenhauer's philosophical
Y works. The bitter experiences of the latter

years had made him, who once had admired
the happy and energetic philosophy of Ludwig Feuer-
bach, directly susceptible to the renunciation-theory
of the Frankfurt thinker, whose profound words on
the reason of artistic enjoyment , the nature of the
genius , the advantages of music over the other arts,
were after his own heart. Schopenhauer's aesthetics
and ethics , his doctrines of the denial of the will to
live, as the only means to be released from the
sufferings of this world , attracted him all the more
strongly, as he had, before he had theoretically come
to know this doctrine, already poetically represented
it in his »Nibelungen«,. in the character of Wotan. He
flow systematically followed the philosopher on all the
by-paths and cross-ways of his thoughts, now explaining
and continuing, and again making artistic use of them.
The first valuable fruit of this study was a new dramatic
creation, whose earliest plan dates back to the year 1854,
>Tristan und Isolde*.

In Wilhelm Mullers »Versuch einer mytholo-
gischen Erklarung der Nibelungensage«, Wagner had
found a reference to the original connection of the
Siegfried and Tristan legend. The latter, he himself

62

believed to be, for the poetic perception, a manner of
supplement to the former. Tristan, like Siegfried, sues
for another, the woman who is appointed for him.
"Whilst in the Nibelungs legend, the principal stress
is laid upon the death of the hero, which results from
this error, the Tristan legend depicts the love-pangs
of the pair, which sees itself, through the like error,
separated by law and by morality. As such a supple-
ment of his »Nibelungen«, Wagner was fond of con-
sidering : Tristan*, when, in 1 857, he was, for the time
being , forced to lay aside the tetralogy. With great
haste he, at that time, executed the older plan; after
few weeks the text of the new drama was completed,
and already in the fall of the same year, he could begin
with the musical composition. Changes in Wagner's
outward life frequently interrupted the progression of
his work. Allured by new prospects which seemed
opening to his creations in Paris, he again visited the
metropolis, in January 1858, for a short space of time.
The following August he forever left Zurich, and for
the coming fall and winter settled down in Venice.
Here, the second act of » Tristan* was completed; after
years had passed, Wagner still spoke of, and praised
the agreeable sensation, which the entire freedom and
unrestraint of creation, the oblivion of all and every
theory, had given him. Only in April he returned to
Switzerland, to Lucerne, in which city, in 1859, the
composition of the entire work was completed.

Wagner's source was the mediaeval poem of
Gottfried von Strassburg, which in a new-high-
germart translation by Hermann Kurz, had already
appeared. But here the legend of Tristan and Isolde
was entirely epically treated, as a master-piece of
narrating poetry, which, however, lacked the least dra-
matic nerve. Epically even, Gottfried's poem was
Wanting an artistic conclusion which his mediaeval con-
tinuators, and later his translator Kurz, had more or
less independently supplemented. Wagner could only

^1
■s

s

(2

63

then attain a dramatically serviceable subject, if, like
in the >Nibelungen«, he freed the simplest original
form of the myth from the abundance of arbitrary ad-
ventures and later additions. But also the scientific
works, in which he sought for advice, offered him
nothing that could be of use to the dramatist. Alone
and independently, he must create this original form
for himself. This he accomplished by taking the relation
of the Tristan to the Siegfried legend as starting point.
In this manner, he invented the fundamental tragical idea,
from which, necessarily, the different conflicts, filled with
the highest tragic, and the entire and in itself com-
pleted dramatic development resulted: Tristan also al-
ready loves the woman whom he woos, under the spell
of the most terrible error, for Marke. The dissension of
his soul, the germ to his tragical guilt, arises from.his
delusion, that, in the possession of his country's crown,
Isolde, whom he loves without hoping to see his passion
ceturned, will be happy. Isolde's hatred, who mis-
understands the motive of his suit, and believes herself
to be despised by the beloved, arises against him;
like Briinhilde she also plots her own and the traitor's
common destruction. In this mood, both drink of the
supposed poisonous potion; before death enters, whose
certain sacrifices they already believe themselves to be,
the barriers of false reserve give way, and they make
the overflowing confession of their love. The magic
love-potion, which in the epic poem was reality, be-
comes symbolic in the drama.

In connection with this artistic perfection of a
transmitted motive is another: Wagner sought morally
to transform what was frivolous in the mediaeval poem.
For this reason, he implanted in his lovers, instead of
the continually returning desire for earthly enjoyment,
an ever increasing longing after death, the releaser
from all earthly troubles; so, after a painful separation,
in which Tristan recognizes his own sufferings as ema-
nating from the universal sufferings of the world, he

64

reunites them not in life, but in death. In the same
manner, particularly by deepening the character of the
king, morally" as well as poetically, he robbed the
relation of the lovers to Marke of the disagreeable
impression, which the older version awakens: Isolde
does not exactly commit adultery, but, like Tristan,
only' betrays Marke's sacrificing friendship. Through
preserving his heroine from the shame of appearing
as the wife of two men, Wagner saved Marke's cha-
racter from the curse of the ridiculous and kept the
deeply tragic tone of his creation pure and unbroken!
Here again, like in single parts of his »Nibelungen«,
Wagner limited himself to the smallest possible num-
ber of personages. All the characters however, parti-
cularly the attendants Kurwenal and Brangane, the noblest
repjresentatives of the most inviolable fidelity, the prac-*
tical mediators between their masters, who live entirely
in their ideal love-world, and sober reality, take active
part in the simple, but with perfected mastership organized
action, which, particularly in the first act, rises to the
highest dramatic effect. It lay already in the character
of this action, in which Wagner wished to erect a
monument to love, that the overflowing feeling of
Tristan and Isolde must unfold itself with lyric freedom.
Again, in the mutual perfection of the dramatic and
lyric elements, the master became apparent, who,
amongst other things, introduced into the full dramatic
life of the second act of his work, with entire pre-
servation of its lyrical elements , the aubade , the
highest forni of mediaeval love-poetry. The language
of »Tristan« also bears a lyrical stamp. In wealth
of pictural imagination and symbolical allusions, as
well as musical sonorousness, the poetical language of
this tragedy is unequalled by any other of Wagner's
dramatic creations. Besides, there never again appear
in the artist's sensibly beautiful manner of expression
such philosophical-abstract contents as in : Tristan*.
Not alone the general fundamental idea of his work

65

stood in close connection with Schopenhauer's
doctrines; the development of individual ideas which
Tristan expresses in communion which he holds with
Isolde or with himself, was often only a poetical circum-
scription and, at the same time, an artistic glorification
of the Frankfort philosopher's fundamental views. But
the hereby threatening danger, the poet, whose task
it was to represent the most dauntless love-passion,
understood to pass untouched: what from the work
of the scientific thinker he had taken as dry reflection,
he changed into warm, living, intensely touching feeling.

With redoubled power this passion streams through
the music of > Tristan*. Its artistic character is the
same as that of the »Nibelungen« , but also in the
tone-language, the lyrical element unfolds itself with
much greater freedom than in the essentially dramatic
music of the tetralogy. In the vocal parts, as well as
in the exceedingly rich orchestration, fluctuates a sea
of the most exquisite melodies, which, after common
themes, separate, reunite and dissolve one into another.
As a kind of study for this grand composition, Wagner,
at that time, wrote, in the same style as his »Tristan«,
partly even with the same melodies, five poems, which,
in thoughts and expressions, often remind of his drama,
and which are filled with the deepest feeling and philo-
sophical reflections.

Almost simultaneously with his tragedy, several
other dramatic ideas, also in connection with his study
of Schopenhauer, arose in the artist's mind. In
spring 1856, he drew, after the mythical legends of
Buddha, the short plan of a more morally than dramati-
cally important piece, »Die Sieger* (»The victors*),
and at about the same time, the figure of Parsifal floa-
ted before his mind. Transiently, he even thought of
bringing his mortally wounded Tristan in direct, if ever
so slight contact with the conqueror of sinful' earthly
pleasure, who strives to attain the sanctuary of the Grail.

During the time in which Wagner composed

Muncker, Wagner. 5

66

:Tristan«, he considered different possibilities of bring-
ing his work, to his artistic satisfaction, upon the stage;
for this purpose, various theatres had already made him
positive offers. Only too quickly, many of these pro-
spects vanished. At last, it was principally Carlsruhe
to which he turned his eyes, where a short time ago,
Grandduke Friedrich, a sovereign who admired
his art and was kindly disposed toward him, had as-
cended the throne. Through his intervention, Wagner
above all hoped to gain, what, in spite of Liszt's
friendship, and the favor in which he stood at the court
at Weimar, had always been denied him, and what,
for fully ten years, he had yearned for, the permission
to return to his fatherland, which should again give
him the long deprived of artistic incitement. Howe-
ver, his ardent wish could not yet be fulfilled. To be
able at least regularly to hear music, Wagner, whose
essentially german nature rose up in arms against every-
thing french, in September 1859, settled down anew
in Paris.

From Germany evil tidings followed him. Chorus-
director Wilhelm Fischer in Dresden, one of his
oldest and truest friends, died in November 1859. To his
memory, to whose untiring help he, as leader, often had
been indebted for a part of his success, Wagner dedi-
cated a touchingly warm obituary. Almost at the same
time, a second misfortune reached him; the plan for
the production of » Tristan* in Carlsruhe was shattered.
In Paris he now hoped to make a performance of his
composition possible. But in spite of the great sen-
sation which, with three preparatory concerts, he made
in the music-world and in the press of the metropolis,
he met with too slight artistic sympathy, as to be
able, at his own risk to venture upon so hazardous a
theatrical enterprise. The command of the emperor to
prepare a performance of »Tannhauser« on the stage
of the grand opera at Paris, freed him from the difficult
situation, into which this impossibility brought him.

^1

The careful preparations took nearly a whole year.
They began with the entire alteration of the first and
of parts of the second act and with the translation of
the text into the french language by two young ad-
mirers of the german artist, who subsequently had his
»Hollander«, »Lohengrin« and »Tristan« rendered into
the same language. These »Quatres poemes d'operas*
he prefaced with a letter addressed to Frederic
Villot, the conservator of the imperial museums,
which, a year later, also appeared in german under the
title »Zukunftsmusik:« (»The music of the future*). In
general, Wagner only repeated, with concise shortness,
the fundamental ideas of his earlier reformatory articles,
particularly of his book on opera and drama and his
»Mitteilung an meine Freunde*. More strongly than
in these works, he emphasized the decided sympathy
which the younger generation brought to music more
than to any other art, and the wider development
which, in harmony with this fact, might be allotted to
music over poetry. His own endeavors to found a
musical-dramatic work of art, he represented as the
consistent continuation of that, what older, by him highly
honoured masters, had already anticipated and begun.
Of the coming performance of -Tannhauser* in parti-
cular, he only made mention with a few unobtrusive
words. In March 1861, this performance took place,
and was made, by a systematically working opposition-
party, bare of all artistic taste or decency, the occasion
for the most scandalous demonstrations, which deeply
degraded the french audiences and decided the german
composer, after the third performance, to withdraw
his work from the stage of the grand opera.

After these last experiences, his stay in Paris was
thoroughly spoiled. Happily however, Germany was again
open to him. In summer i860, after he had made
renewed petitions, the return to the fatherland had
been granted him ; only the kingdom of Saxony was
closed to him, until March 1862. The firsts results

68

of the longed for permission, were short visits, in i860,
to Frankfort on the Main, Darmstadt and Baden-Baden.
After the »Tannhauser« performance, Wagner returned
definitely to Germany, and in the course of the follow-
ing years, visited Paris only several times for the space
of a few weeks. Respectfully and heartily he was every-
where met by the german audiences ; but his immediate
aim, an artistically satisfying performance of »Tristan<,
which he pursued with ardent longing and untiring
energy, he was, in the course of the following years, not
able to attain. In Vienna particularly, the tragedy, under
Wagner's direction, was studied with the greatest
care and enthusiasm ; but again and again the rehear-
sals were interrupted by the illness of the artist who
had undertaken the title-r61e, until finally, after almost
two years of labour, the production of the composition
was indefinitely postponed. Only in concerts, which led
him through entire Germany and far beyond its boun-
daries, to St. Petersburgh, Moscow and Pesth, Wagner
was enabled to produce fragments of = Tristan* and
the »Nibelungen«, certainly before enthusiastically ani-
mated audiences, but always in a disconnected manner,
whose artistic want must have filled him with the
deepest pain. Nevertheless, in spite of these exciting
and finally always disappointing hopes and, in the high-
est sense of the word, unsuccessful endeavors, he
preserved, year after year, the desire and courage to
new creation : in those first restless months of his
return from exile, he wrote »Die Meistersinger
von Nurnberg« (»The niaster-singers of Nurem-
berg*).

In a happy mood, he had once in Marienbad, 1845,
made the first plan to a comic opera, which, in cheer-
fully moved action, was to represent the contrast be-
tween the narrow-minded master-singers in the Nurem-
berg of the sixteenth century, and the artistically pro-
ductive national spirit, as well as the individually pe-
culiar and significant development of the old art of

69

the minne-singers. The majority of the principal ideas
contained in the drama, were here already effectively
interlaced. Only the most important female figure of
the comedy, Eva, yet disappeared, as it seems, too
much behind her masculine partners; the character
of Hans Sachs as well may have lacked the humor
springing from painful renunciation. The r61e of the
apprentice David seems to have been treated much
more incidentally, and the drubbing-scene with all its
comical ingredients seems to have been entirely want-
ing. These and other secondary ideas, which not
alone broadened the action and substantiated it more
artistically, but also served to deepen the characters,
were combined with the old plan, which Wagner,
after the space of sixteen years, in Paris, in the
winter of 1861/62, again took up and quickly com-
pleted. In Biebrich near Mainz, where he spent the
spring and summer of 1862, he began with the
musical composition, and, in the following year, con-
tinued it, particularly in Penzing near Vienna. Then the
outward occurrences of his life, and the recommence-
ment of the composition of » Siegfried*, interrupted
for the space of a j'ear and a half his work at »Die
Meistersinger«. All the more energetically it pro-
gressed in 1866 and 1867 in Tribschen near Lucerne,
where the score was completed in October 1867.

Already in his youth, Wagner had received a
lively impression of the master-singers' life in Nurem-
berg, through his perusal of E. T. A. Hoffmann's tale
»Meister Martin der Kiifer und seine Gesellen*. It led
him, at the same time, to the source from which Hoff-
mann principally drew his knowledge of the old city
and the vocal art which was there cultivated, to Johann
Christoph Wagenseil's chronicle of Nuremberg of
1697. Other inferior traits he may have taken from
August Hagen's »Norica« (1829) and other works on
the history of culture. A chief source of poetical incite-
ment became his loving study of the greatest master-

70

singer of whom Nuremberg can boast, of Hans Sachs.
Through his works at once simple and clear, life-like
and ingenuously mild, Wagner became acquainted
with the popular, fresh and humorous tone, the charac-
teristic language, excellently equipped with old dialectic
and familiar words and forms, and the old german
lightly rhymed verse, which, in the metrical licence
given it by young Goethe and ingeniously augmen-
tated by Wagner, served the dramatist as the fittest
form, to poetically, vigorously and, at the same time,
popularly express the mentally highest and spiritually
deepest sentiments, as well as all, that seemed drastic
and common place. The contents also of this or
that verse, and several favorite turns of expressions,
the old master transmitted directly to the younger.
Besides Hans Sachs' own works, Wagner had read
others, in which the person of the Nuremberg poet
figured as the dramatic centre. Already Johann Lud-
wig Deinhardstein had written a drama, founding
on which, Gustav Albert Lortzing, together with
the actor Philipp Reger, had written a comic opera
»Hans Sachs*, which, in 1840, first appeared in Leipsic
and later on was performed on other stages. In both
pieces, particularly in the latter, Wagner found several
important motives of the love-story, which he further
developed in his piece, as well as cleverly delineated
traits for the master-singers' school. In deviating from
his predecessors, and letting, in place of Hans Sachs,
a young knight enter into contest for the lovely bride
with the unpoetical master-singer, who bungles after
prescribed rules, Wagner raised the entire subject
of his drama into an artistically much higher sphere.
Now, for the first time, with the historical contrast
between »Minnesang« and »Meistersang«, the eternal
contrast between true, free art and pedantic professional
rhymstering became apparent. Together with this fact,
there appeared, unsought for, numerous ironical and
satirical allusions, mostly only very delicately indicated

n

between the lines, to Wagner's own artistic endeavors
and the enmity which, for this reason, his colleagues
bore him.

The »Meistersinger« are not alone a comprehen-
sive, faithful picture, filled with a true patriotic spirit,
of german civilization of the past , but, at the same
time, a typically authentic representation of the, at all
times, uniform battle between genius and philistinism,
in the form of a comedy, which, in the entire german
literature, is unequalled in the preeminence of its dra-
matic exposition, in the continuity and surety of the
development, in the care, delicacy and truth with which
the characters are delineated, in the vastness and wealth
of ideas and metaphors, and finally in the clearness
and humorous freshness of expression. Here, as in
»Tannhauser«, the vocal art is the subject of the
drama. This subject in itself demanded musical com-
position. And' no manner of composition seemed fitter
for the peculiar character of the steadily continuous
action, than just that, which Wagner, since his »Rhein-
gold«, had entirely made his own. Externally, the music
of the »Meistersinger« certainly differs from that of the
»Nibelungen« or »Tristan« by the disproportionately
greater number of choruses and of fuller ensemble-
scenes. But never, also in this piece, is the dramatic
truth violated by the mere unfettering of the masses,
after the manner of the conventional opera. The cho-
ruses and the ensembles in the »Meistersinger« are
only uniform whenever they shall represent already
existing vocal choruses; are they, however, to indicate,
the ideas and feelings of a varied multitude, they
become dissolved into different parts, each of which
receives not only an individual text, but also an inde-
pendent rhythmical movement.

Directly after Wagner had, in 1862, published the
text-book of his »Meistersinger«, he decided to make
his »Nibelungen«, which, hitherto, had been accessible
to only a small number of friends, known to the gene-

72

ral public. This he did in the spring of 1863, and
accompanied his work with a preface, in which he de-
monstrated his already completely developed plan for
a future performance of the tetralogy. Already he had
thought of the possibility of erecting, in one of the
smaller german cities, which possessed no theatre, after
a plan, which, together with Semper, he had carefully
considered, a simple provisional theatre, with seats
amphitheatrically arranged for the public, besides an
invisible orchestra; here, after rehearsing for several
months, he intended to give, on four successive summer-
evenings, three times performances of his »Nibelungen«,
in the highest possible perfection of art, before an
audience, assembled from near and far for this festival.
To be able to cover the expenses of the undertaking,
he needed the assistance either of a society of rich
men and women, who were admirers of art, or of a
german sovereign, who was willing to" devote to a
higher artistic purpose the annual sums of money,
which, until then, had been lavished for the opera at
his court-theatre. But without the least prospect that
either of these wishes might be fulfilled, Wagner
closed his preface with the renunciating confession:
»I no longer cherish the hope of living to see the
performance of my Buhnenfestspiel."

In the following years, this conviction, that, in his
purest and completest endeavors, he must forego a
truly artistic success, gained still more ground. Mo-
mentary triumphs in concerts could just as little shake
this conviction, as the applause with which his pro-
positions for a reform of the Vienna court-theatre (in
the Vienna »Botschafter« 1863) were for the present
received. Far from Utopian wishes, Wagner, always
practical, demanded that the number of theatre-evenings
should be reduced and, as indemnification, good, that
is to say, intelligible and comprehensible performances
should be given; to make this more readily possible,
he wished to have several regulations of the parisian

73

grand opera introduced in the Viennese court-theatre.
As Wagner, although his opinions, in tlie first moment,
had been approved of, did not dare hope that the com-
petent authorities would really accept his proposals, so,
in general, he was gradually forced to notice, that the
favor, which the direction of the Viennese opera had
at first shown him, was of no duration. At least it
was plainly given him to understand, that for a per-
formance of his »Meistersinger< he must no more, than
on any other, count on the Viennese stage. This per-
ception undermined his creative energy completely.
From mankind he had nothing more to hope, not even
from his people, that certainly received him with accla-
mations, but lacked the energy or power to assist
him in the realization of his ideal; therefore, from now
on, his desire was to live far from all men, and parti-
cularly in complete retirement from all german art-life.
A friend had invited him to his estate in Switzerland;
for the present, Wagner intended to accept this offer.
In April 1.864, he left Penzing. In Stuttgart, where he
had tarried on his journey, the unexpected news reached
him, that the way to the fulfillment of his highest de-
sires was, at last, smoothed for him. What had seemed
incredible, had now come to pass ; the german sove-
reign had arisen who, in a truly royal sense and in
loving comprehension of the greatest artist of his time,
was'willing to become his and his aspirations protector.

On the 10* of March
1864, King Ludwig II.,
at the age of eighteen
years, had ascended
the bavarian throne.
Intellectually highly gifted and
particularly endowed with a
warm enthusiastic a-fipreciation
for artistic beauty, he already
had received the deepest im-
pression of Wagner's works
when he, for the first time, i"'^" f" ^ ''<=^'^pi="'°"== '" '^'''"'"=''-
attended their performance in Munich. His admiration
for the. poet and composer grew, the more he became
acquainted with his essays and plans, and this admiration
was now accompanied by the energetic desire to help
him with his royal power, who by all had been deserted.

75

Immediately after his accession to the throne, he called
Wagner to him. In May the artist, for the first time,
stood face to face ^vith the splendid youth, and from
J. that time , both were united by a friendship founded
on the noblest sentiments of the human heart, as well
as the highest aspirations of the soul, whose fervent
fidelity and genial charm no stroke of fate was ever
more to break.

In frequent and direct association with King Lud-
wig, "Wagner spent the summer in the country, in
Starnberg; in autumn, he took up his abode in Munich.
Friends of his genius soon received calls to the bavarian
capital, at first Hans von Biilow, soon after Ludwig
Schnorr von Carolsfeld, the first and, since his
time, unexcelled creator of Tristan, who, unfortunately,
died suddenly (in July 1 865), before he could be lastingly
won for the Munich stage, Peter Cornelius, com-
poser and poet, and others. Liszt and Semper also
came. The latter received the royal order to sketch
plans for the theatre which Wagner was in need of,
for the performance of his »Nibelungen«. For it was,
above all, tho completion of his tetralogy, which the
favor of Ludwig II. sought to make possible for
the artist.

But the recommencement of the » Siegfried* com-
position, did not hinder Wagner from other activity
as musician and as author. He prepared and partly
led performances of the »Fliegende Hollander* and
»Tannhauser«, particularly the four first representations
of »Tristan« in June and July of 1865, which, in every
respect, rose far above the daily theatre-routine, and
attracted numerous and enthusiastic guests to Munich.
To the gratitude and love which he bore his noble
protector, he gave, yet in the year 1864, .artistic ex-
pression in his »Huldigungsmarsch« (»March of
homage*), whose musical development, similar to that
of Wagner's larger orchestral works, shows the dra-
matic peculiarity of his manner of composition; the

76

simple, principal theme of the march seems vigorously
to break its way through the figured, intermediate
movements.

For his royal friend and by his especial desire,
Wagner wrote, at the same time, an essay on state
and religion. In the light of Schopenhauer's philo-
sophy, he now undoubtedly saw single circumstances
in state and Christianity with different eyes than fifteen
years ago, when, under the influence of Feuerbach
and Hegel, he had repeatedly expressed his opinions
on these subjects. In his apprehension of royalty in
particular, Wagner went further than Schopenhauer.
The ideal of the state he saw represented in the person
of the king, whose almost superhuman position urges
him more than others, to take life from its most deeply
earnest side, and whose fate becomes tragic through
his endeavor after the, in this world, unattainable ideal
of justice and humanity. For this reason, he more than
anyone else requires the true, in the innermost feeling
of humanity existing religion, which is free from all
dogma and disputation ; it alone can assist him in
accomplishing his ideal. Through bright illusions, it is
the duty of art, to carry him, now and again, away from
the earnestness of life. Art, the beginning and end
of all Wagner's theoretical investigations, again easily
formed the conclusion of this essay, which, in an in-
geniously instructive and admonishing manner, seemed
to pursue entirely different aims.

Likewise at the desire of the king, Wagner
wrote an extensive report over a german music-school,
which was to be founded in Munich. For the time
being putting aside all that was purely theoretical, such
as the study of composition and lectures on aesthetics
or history of music, he all the more thoroughly cared
for the practical education of the scholars, not alone
in an elementary technical manner, but also in the
highest musical sense. He demanded, above all, the
most careful guidance for the acquirement of a correct

n

execution. Most important appeared to him a singing-
school combined with artistic (not virtuos) instruction
on the piano ; to these a theatre-school and a complete

orchestra-institute were, in
the course of time, to be
added. His highest aim was
to found an artistic style for
the execution of the works
of older german masters
and, in connection with it,
also for the crea- tive
further develop- ^ ment

%

^ "Ti -.. ii

of the german music
in the future. It was
not possible to call
Wagner's plan with
all its details, exactly
as he wished them,
into life. However,
in the place of the
conservatory, which
in 1865 had been
closed, a new music-

\d-{

Wagner's dwelling-house in Munich.

school was in Munich, in 1867, called to' life, which
in general founded on his report, and whose direction
was at first laid into Billow's hands.

But long before this plan was executed, all manner
of jealous people, whose instruments were scandal-
mongering local papers, had, through an intricate web
of low intrigues, forced the king to part with his
»favorite«. Powerless against such foes, the king and
the artist, whose friendship had remained untouched,
decided to mutually bring the called for sacrifice; in
December 1865, Wagner left Munich, travelled to
Geneva, from which place he went on to the south
of France, and from there to Tribschen, near Lucerne.
From this place, he did not return to Munich until 1867,
when he several times, for a short stay, travelled to
that city, to personally superintend particularly important'
performances of his works. So in June 1867 ♦Lohen-
grin* was perfectly performed; on the 21" of June 1869
the »Meistersinger«, on the 22^ of September 1869
»Rheingold«, on the 26* of June 1870 the »Walkiire«
were, for the first time, brought upon the stage. In
Tribschen, the artist devoted himself almost wholly to
vigorous work, now however animated and cheered
by the always more confiding hope, that the favor
of his royal friend was a warrant for full success. For
a length of time, Biilow and his wife.Cosima, a
daughter of Liszt, and the young musically highly
talented Hans Richter lived in his immediate vicinity;
more transiently other guests visited the artist; already
in May 1866 King Ludwig came to his friend.

After the completion of the score for the »Meister-
singer«, Wagner, seemingly as a recreation from his
artistic work, again gave expression to different literary
ideas. An external incident gave him encouragement:
the »Suddeutsche Presse«, a paper of good repute and
praiseworthy political tendencies, at whose edition an
old Dresden friend of Wagner's took part, moved from
Stuttgart to Munich. For this paper, he wrote, besides

79

several reviews on new books, spiced with satire, no-
ticeably the extensive treatise »Deutsche Kunst und
deutsche Politik* (»German art and german poli-
tics*, 1868), which was also singly published. As
hitherto in all his theoretical works, Wagner's ulti-
mate desire again was, to artistically reform the ger-
man theatre (whose present state was the sharpest
illustration of the neglect into which german artistic
spirit had fallen) in a truly national sense, and by
these means, to elevate the taste for art. In detail,
he now repeatedly expressed thoughts, which formerly
he had already often demonstrated. Now however,
incited by the political thinker Constantin Frantz,
he conceived the foundation of a genuine art, in so far
as it struggles vehemently against french civilization,
which for centuries mightily governed us, as an act of
veritable german politics, which should most surely
deliver us from the ascendency of the french state.
Significantly touching the range of the political-national
ground in his, in reality, aesthetic investigations, he
alluded to the most varied questions of public life,
which, just at that time, were much talked of, to the
claims of church and state for the dominion over the
schools, to the general obligation to serve in the army,
and to the sovereign's right of pardoning. He showed
the pernicious influence of french spirit on german art,
the universal and merited disdain which was shown
the modern theatre in Germany, examined the relation
of the actor to the author and, in connection, the
general contrast of idealism and realism in art, illu-
strated the position of the german theatre to the author,
the musician, the painter and sculptor, but also to
the school, to society, to the state and kingdom, con-
sidered the gracious care with which Bavaria's sove-
reigns fostered arts and sciences, and recognized it
to be Bavaria's especial vocation in Germany, to pro-
mote the german spirit, which strives to reach beyond
purely practical usefulness, and consequently principally

8o

to develop a german style in the realm of the drama,
a vocation through which alone Bavaria could lastingly
maintain an independent position beside Prussia. Under
this style he understood »the perfectly acquired and
legalized harmony, which must exist between the thea-
trical representation and the represented truly german
poetical composition*. With vigorous "emphasis, but
without the least partial narrowness or passion, Wagner
expressed his convictions on all these subjects. Logi-
cally he founded what he said, with the greatest care;
outwardly, he loosely connected the single ideas, with-
out in the least giving any attention to a systematic,
uniform development of his essay.

With his essay on leading, written in the last months
of the year 1869, he again returned to the exclusive
range of music. In numerous examples which he took
from his own experience, he showed, how little the
majority of modern german conductors, particularly the
elegant, superficial leaders from Mendelssohn's school,
understood to bring the beauties of musical master-
pieces, in theatre or concert, to an artistically satisfying
expression. The reason for this want, he saw in these
musicians' slight comprehension for the vocal art ; only
through it, was the correct measure of time . to be
ascertained, and only a correct tempo could teach the
right musical delivery. A characteristic , significant
delivery, that seemed to be of most importance to
the greatest leader of the nineteenth century. Of all
theoretical rules, he held himself completely aloof; a
good practical example he deemed the only method
of teaching a correct manner of delivery, and also the
only means of checking the influence which this charac-
terless, shallow manner of leading had upon the modern
german art of composition.

New and great prospects were opened, at the
important year of 1870, to the man as well as to the
artist Wagner. In Cosima von Biilow he wedded
a woman after whom he had , for years , painfully

Richard Wagner after a photograph by Elliot and Fry
(London 1877).

longed, and- who, besides the devoted and passionate
love she bore him, entirely understood his artistic
aspirations, as well as his whole spiritual being. She
was the first to let him feel all the joy of an own,
comfortable home, and all the bliss of an unclouded
heart- and soul-union ; she was intermediator between
the artist and the outer world, which, so often until
now, had, to the sensitive, to all the indignities of
life helplessly exposed artist, been a source of misery.
For her, after the birth of his son Siegfried, Wagner
composed , by combining anew in artistic and fine
manner the sweetest themes of his like-named drama,
the »Siegfried-idyll«, a delicately conceived orchestra-
piece, which gracefully depicted his home -happiness
in the midst of a charming landscape. With the most
joyful enthusiasm, he greeted, at the same epoch, the
rise of entire Germany against the archenemy. In the
victories of the german nation over the french army,
he believed to see a warrant, that now also german
art would celebrate the victory for which he had so
long and vainly wrung. Enlivened by this hope, he
exerted his strength to new, extended and successful
activity.

In September 1870, he completed his philosophi-
cally profound essay on Beethoven, which is replete
with the highest enthusiasm for the celebrated genius
and for music in general. What Schopenhauer, as
layman in music, had only pronounced as a deep para-
dox, that, in contrast to the other arts (whose objects
are the ideas, the appearances of things) music is the
direct image of the will itself, which is the inner being
of the world, Wagner, as musician by profession, deve-
loped with the assistance of other philosophical matter,
which he found in the works of the Frankfort thinker,
to a theoretically exhausting explanation of the being
of music and of the nature of the musician, and eluci-
dated it by the example of Beethoven, by the deve-
lopment of his genius and by his relation to the world

Munckei", Wagner. 6

82

and to his art. Through some of the master's principal
creations, he illuminated his particular historical merits,
the reconduction of the melody to the highest natural
simplicity, and the extension and enhanced effect
of the symphonic structure, by the manner in which
he independently combined purely instrumental music
with instrumentally treated singing voices. In consi-
dering the relationship of Beethoven's and Shake-
speare's artistic nature, Wagner, at the same time,
lifted his eyes to the ideal of the true drama, which
always floated before them. After this ideal, after a
noble reinspiration of german art and civilization, which,
in Beethoven's spirit, he wished to see freed from the
dominion of french taste, and released from audacious
fashion, he called to his valiant german people to strive
in a reformatory, not in a revolutionary spirit, as bene-
factors of the world ; for to these belongs precedence
even before the conquerors.

Several months later, the earnest battle against
french taste was followed by a burlesque after-play,
a sprightly satire on ipe besieged Parisians, their govern-
ment and warfare, their patriotically declaiming poet
Victor Hugo, their pleasure in the opera and ballet,
and, at the same time, on Offenbach and the german
theatre ruled by parisian fashions, the whole quickly
perfected and, under the title »Eine Capitulation*
(»A capitulation*), as a comedy after the manner of
Aristophanes, given to a younger friend for the com-
position of the necessary music. Carried by patriotic
enthusiasm, Wagner's art swung itself to higher
spheres, when, after the victory of his people, the
german empire was founded; he composed the »Kaiser-
marsch« (»March in honour of the emperor«). As once
in his >Huldigungsmarsch«, so in this composition he
employed the same form, which was divided after the
same plan, and was rhythmically throughout similar.
Into it he poured a melody which was yet 'richer in
its conquering power and electrifying fire, and which,

83

for this reason, also needed, besides a larger festival
orchestra, a numerous mixed chorus.

At about the same time, the plan ripened in him
to collect his scientific works and poetical compositions,
which were greatly dispersed in pamphlets, text-books
and news-papers, and already in summer 1870, the first
volume was completed, which, in the two following
years, was succeeded by eight others, and after Wag-
ner's death, by a tenth. Many of the artist's literary and
poeiical productions, particularly those of earlier years,
were here omitted, others had been more or less re-
vised. The majority of his works were chronologi--
cally ordered, an arrangement which outwardly already
showed, that their author did not wish them to be
regarded as an organically connected scientific system,
but that he principally sought to give in them, an
historically faithful portrait of the course of his own
intellectual development. In what close, harmonious
connection the literary opinions of the most different
periods of his life stood, were, just at that time, illu-
strated by two smaller works of Wagner, his re-
miniscences of Auber (who had died in May 1871),
with its excellent characteristic of the cheerful music
of this true french composer and his principal com-
position »La muette de Portici*, and the still earlier
written essay on the purpose of the opera, which, in
April 1871, Wagner read in the Berlin academy of
arts. Single principal points of what, in »Oper und
Drama*, had been exhaustingly said, he here concisely
drew together, but emphasized more strongly the re-
lation of opera and play to the mimical performances
of the german theatre, the influence of theatrical effect
upon the development of these two species of art,
and the necessary part which the actors and singers
take in their ennoblement to the true drama.

Another and more important purpose, Wagner
pursued on this trip to Berlin in the spring of 1871.
The political elevation of Germany awakened in him

6*

the slumbering courage with which he
now vigorously and steadily undertook
the entire realization of his artistic ideals. ,
The wish of King Ludwig to build a
Bayreuth. theatre in Munich worthy of the per-
formance of the artist's »Nibelungen«, had been frus-
trated by the agitations of unintelligent and ill-natured
opponents. Now however, confiding in the help of his
royal friend, and, besides, assisted by a society of ad-
mirers of his art, Wagner, who had, by this time,
for the greater part, completed the composition of his
tetralogy, grasped the idea of himself building a theatre
for the representation of his »Nibelungen«, and of there
having his work performed by chosen artists. For the
site of his »Biihnenfestspielh6use«, he chose the bavarian
city Bayreuth, which was entirely apart from all artistic
life. In his youth, he once had travelled through it,
and it had made him a friendly impression; upon a
visit in April and later on in December 1871, he found
not alone the purely personal impression confirmed,
but the city, in general, entirely suitable for his pur-
poses, and its official representatives willing to meet
his wishes and to assist him in their promotion. Soon
the ties of warmest friendship bound him to the direc-
tors of the municipal administration, who, before they
had learned to admire his art, faithfully loved his bene-
volence, his depth of feeling, truth and amiable cheer-
fulness in social intercourse, and sincerely admired his

8s

staunchness of character and his earnest manner of
work, which never lost its aims from view. Joyfully
Wagner recognized, that the little franconian city
might, in reality, become his second home; in April 1872,
he forever took up his abode in Bayreuth. During the
first summer, he lived in the small hotel belonging

to the castle Fantaisie, in

the village of Donndorf, a

': ■ , ~^' . ; good. hour's distance from

the city; he then moved
into hired appartements
."■,' - in the city of Bayreuth,.

andini874the.';<
lessly wander-
possession of
»Wahnfried«,
rest of his days,
beautiful and
His artistic

Wagner\
dwelling-house
in Bayieuth.

hitherto rest-
ing man took
his own house
where, for the
he found a
happy home,
undertaking

was treated with derision by his opponents and a great
part of the german press, but by his friends was every-
where greeted with heartfelt joy. For the obtainment
of the necessary sum of money , the young pianist

86

Karl Tausig, a personal friend of Wagner's, labored
with the most energetic zeal, and after his unexpectedly
early death (July 1 871) the wife of the prussian minister
of the interior, baroness Marie von Schleinitz. For
the propagation of the Bayreuth idea, Emil Heckel,
proprietor of a music-store in Mannheim, founded
in 1 87 1 the first »Richard-Wagner-Verein«, which was
soon followed by the foundation of similar societies in
many german and foreign cities. Wagner himself
interrupted his work at the »Gotterdammerung«, to
confer minutely with architects, scene -shifters and
decoration-painters , to take trips for the purpose of
visiting the different societies, and particularly to give
concerts for the benefit of his undertaking, which, in
the course of the following years , took place in
different large cities, such as Berlin, Mannheim, Ham-
burg, Cologne, Vienna and Pesth, everywhere accom-
panied by the most magnificent success. In a similar
manner, his friends, in particular Biilow, sought with
the utmost devotion, to promote his undertaking. On
the 22"^ of May 1872, the solemn act of laying the
corner-stone for the new theatre , was accomplished
in Bayreuth. Combined with it was the perfect per-
formance of the ninth symphony and of the »Kaiser-
marsch«, which at once were the first trial of what
Richard Wagner, with qualified singers and musicians,
who unquestioningly obeyed him, could artistically render.
Different observations, which, at this occasion, claimed
his notice, particularly on certain passages of the ninth
symphony , where , to distinctly set off the melody,
alterations in the instrumentation were necessary, he
gave utterance to in an essay, which appeared 1873,
in the »Musikalische Wochenblatt«.

The summer and fall after the laying of the
foundation-stone, were especially rich in literary work.
To this period belongs, besides several smaller essays
and missives, the significant and instructive treatise,
devoted to the memory of the » great* Wilhelmine

Schroder-Devrient, »Ueber Schauspieler und Sanger*
(»0n actors and singers«). Supported by his own ar-
tistic experience and by the historical study of the
development of the german theatre, as well as of the
histrionic art in general, Wagner, who here could
allude to what in his earlier essays he had already
said, sought to fathom the nature of mimical perfor-
mance. Its fundamental trait he found to be the truth-
fulness of the representation, which is directly opposed
to all self-conscious, no matter how virtuos, comedy-
playing, and which transmits the actor into a state of
self-forgetfulness and entrancement, with which he again
is able to imbue the spectator. Entirely convinced of
the high artistic vocation of the actor, and not less
of the complete degeneration of the present german
theatre, with its false pathos and conventionally sense-
less manners, he, above all, called upon actors and
singers to return to simplicity, as the only means of
regaining the art, which is indispensable for the worthy
reproduction of the works of Shakespeare, Goethe,
Schiller and Kleist, as well as of german composers.

During a trip which, in November and December
1872, Wagner undertook to different german opera-
stages, extending southward to Basel and northward
to Bremen, he gained a sometimes alarmingly clear
insight into this degeneration of the german theatre.
Immediately on his return, he reported, in the »Musi-
kalische Wochenblatt*, with unrelenting but necessary
frankness, the impressions which he had received on
this trip ; in the details, the essay offered, particularly
for leaders, an abundance of instruction.

Besides these essays, which entered directly into
the nature and being of art, Wagner, during the same
year, published several smaller pamphlets, explanatory
statements and reports, which were to give his friends
and patrons an account of the progress of the building
and of the other preparations for the Bayreuth Biihnen-
festspiele. Perceptibly the undertaking advanced, in spite

of some unexpected, and not before to ~|*5r
be computed obstacles: in August 1873, V
the theatre-building could be brought
under roof, and already the following summer piano-
rehearsals with the single singers could be begun. More
rigorous and complete piano- and orchestra-rehearsals
followed in July and August 1875 in the Festspiel-
house itself, whose acoustics proved to be of the very
best; numerous friends of Wagner had assembled
from far and near, to partifcipate in these preliminary
rehearsals. Ceaselessly the work was continued during

89

the winter and spring, Wagner allowing himself the
least time for rest, although, besides other things, the
performances of -Tannhauser* and »Lohengrin« in Vienna
and -Tristan* in Berlin necessitated his absence from
Bayreuth for several

months Besides ,
everythmg else, he ^
had been officially
: begged to compose

a festival march for the celebration
of the centennial of the United-States
of North- America, which musically de-
veloped the sense of Goethe's words
»He only merits liberty and life, who
day by day must conquer them*, in a
similar dramatic gradation as his two
former marches. In June, the rehearsals
recommenced in the Festspielhouse, in regular un-
interrupted succession, for the singers as well as for
the orchestra under Hans Richter's leadership, first
apart and then together. Soon already, such a masterly

The auditorium of ihe
Biihnenfestspielliouse

90

perfection became apparent , that the last principal
rehearsals and, in particular, the grand rehearsals, at
which King Ludwig was present, resembled finished
performances.

They were directly followed, from the is'""' to the
30* of August 1876, by the first Bayreuth Buhnen-
festspiele. Three times, always on four successive
evenings, the »Ring des -Nibelungen« was given in a
memorable manner, which completely fulfilled the ideal
of the Meister, before an enthusiastic audience, which
had streamed together from all parts of the world.
Celebrated statesmen, men of learning and particularly
artists, did homage, together with the acclamating multi-
tude of spectators, to the genius who had awakened
his creation to life, whilst foreign and german poten-
tates loudly applauded the once prosecuted man. To-
gether with the Granddukes Karl Alexander of
Saxe-Weimar and Friedrich of Baden, patrons of
Wagner in his years of calamity, Emperor Wilhelm
and numerous other german sovereigns attended the
first performances ; for t^e third cycle of the Fest-
spiele. King Ludwig of Bavaria, the noblest friend
of the Meister and of his art, appeared. Until the
last moments, Wagner's opponents had, in hostily led
papers, disseminated doubt, insult and calumny; the
entire success they only met with rancorous censure
and derision. Nevertheless, true german art had, in
August 1876, gained a victory, which, in national signi-
ficance, equalled the political triumphs of 1870 and
1 87 1. The guests of artistic perception, who had
assembled in Bayreuth from all parts of the globe,
bowed admiringly before the german genius ; the work
of art of the future, which for so long a time had
been incredulously ridiculed, he seemed lastingly to
have implanted into the german soil of the present.

%ss*»^

id but the german people now faithfully
hold to its greatest living artist and
follow his example, then Wagner's
Festspiele could lead to the direct
_^ establishment and universal national fostering
'~"~ of a true dramatic art of specifically german
spirit. But the active assistance of the majority of
Wagner's friends had only aimed to bring about the
first success; now it was accomplished, their zeal abated.
The german people, as such, did not understand to value
the national gift offered them by the artist, and neglected
the duties which sprung from it. In what Wagner now
strove to reach, and what, as a necessary consequence
of the endeavors he had hitherto made, he must continue
to aspire to, he saw himself, in the main, again thrown
back upon himself and a few friends. Those who had,
until now, been promoters of the undertaking, paid not
even the slightest concern to the pecuniary deficit, with
which the Festspiele of 1876, in spite of their brilliant
artistic success, had closed. To cover it, Wagner
after his return, in December, from a pleasure-trip to
Italy, tried different means and even went, in May 1877,
to London, where, in several large concerts, he per-
formed fragments from all his works — an experiment
which artistically was crowned with perfect success,
brought the Meister high honours and won many friends

92

for his music , which , however , was attended by such
immense expenses, that nothing less than a surplus of
money was gained for Bayreuth. Finally, Wagner him-
self paid the debt, which, for his private means, was
a not inconsiderable expenditure: he took the money
from the revenues, which the »Nibelungen« perfor-
mances in Munich yielded him. At the same time, he
decided to abandon his tetralogy — against his original
intention — to the general stages. Founding on what
had been accomplished in the summer of 1876, he
wished to call to life an energetic and stately society
of patrons for the fostering and conservation of the
Biihnenfestspiele in Bayreuth, and with its help, a manner
of musical and dramatical high-school, or rather to
train young singers and musicians for the production
of the greatest compositions principally of german
masters, which he himself would guide and, in the
summer, crown through regular representations of these
works and especially of his own dramas from the
» Hollander* on; but this plan was also unsuccessful.
What still appeared before his eyes as the last task
of his life, was the foundation of a german style for
the delivery of musical and dramatic works, which he
could only teach through continually setting the prac-
tical example, a task which, however, could not suffi-
ciently rouse the sympathy of his people. The new
Society of patrons counted too few members; the aid
which Wagner hoped to receive from the german
empire, never came; and so, instead of a practically
active school, only a theoretically preparatory monthly
was called to life in January 1878, the »Bayreuther
Blatter*, to which Wagner contributed, and which
was edited by his younger friend, Hans von Wol-
zogen.

To this monthly, the Meister gave everything that
he now yet wrote for the public, a considerable num-
ber of larger and smaller essays on the most dissimilar
subjects. In them, he reported of the artistic gain

93

which he could ascribe to the Festspiele of 1876, of
the intentions which he had joined to the school-plan
which had failed, of the conditions under which new
Festspiele should take place in Bayreuth. In connection
with earlier works, particularly with the essay » Deutsche
Kunst und deutsche Politik<, he examined the nature of
the german intellect, the misuse of the term » modern*,
the relation of our present audiences, which are edu-
cated by newspapers, theatres and universities, to the
works of art, the tragic fate of the creative spirit, in
so far, as its production is subject to the limits of time
and space, the conception of the terms author, prophet,
singer, narrator, poet, artist, musician, composer, the
significance of the poetical text for the musical melody,
and the inextinguishable difference between dramatic
and symphonic composition. As these essays were, for
the first, only intended for a smaller circle of friends,
Wagner allowed himself greater liberty of form. To
thoughts full of significant earnestness, which, with strict
logic, he founded one upon another, he strung merry
fancies, such as often arise during an unconstrained,
easy conversation; sport and wit he largely intermingled
in these essays; at all times, his delivery was impreg-
nated with satire, irony and humor. The key-note to
all his utterances was a deep sadness, which could easily
be accounted for by his recent experiences. Wagner
felt himself and his aspirations to be in the sharpest
contrast to the modern world and its entire culture.
With the same sharpness, he now fought against the
modern practices in state, society and art, against the
manner in which art and science were cultivated in
the new empire, against the german theatre, the ger-
man universities, the present state of religion, against
the newest attempts at composition in Germany, against
the unintelligent, superficial imitators of his own music,
and finally against the misuses of the german press.
With pain and disgust, he everywhere saw the incessant
decay of true german nature, and again believed to

94

find the principal reason of this decay in the rapidly
increasing power of Judaism. Therefore he persecuted
it, with unmerciful and ever new mockery, as the most
dangerous foe of the german spirit. These pessimistically
dark reflections were only interrupted by heartfelt warmth
and hallowed, as well as cheerful enthusiasm, when he
contemplated the true, primeval qualities of the Ger-
mans, and the sublime glory of their grand music.
As in the period in which it was entirely subject to
romanic influence, the german spirit through Sebastian
Bach again showed itself capable of life, so Wagner
saw in music alone the preserver of german art, which
modern culture has almost stifled.

Fundamental ideas of Schopenhauer's philo-
sophy were, already in these essays, further developed.
What Wagner, since the fall of 1879, wrote for the
»Bayreuther Blatter*, founded still more on the doc-
trines of Schopenhauer, and on the braminical-
buddhistic religion, of whose praise he was full. Added
to these were the similar endeavors of Ernst von
Weber and his agitations against vivisection, which
Wagner shared with the most passionate energy, and
those of Count Arthur von Gobineau, whose deep
poems he was fond of reading, whose chief scientific
work on the dissimilarity of human races had made him
the deepest impression, and whose personal friendship
(since 1880) he felt to be a rich acquisition for heart
and mind. The profound essay on »Religion und
Kunst* (» Religion and art*) with its supplements and
additions, is particularly based on these foundations.
Wagner started from the essential conformity of the
Indian and christian religions, and from the enlivening
influence of the latter upon all true art, which lost
its nobility, as soon as it became secularized. Both
these sublimest of religions already teach the aban-
donment of the world and of its passions, and are
therefore based on the knowledge of the sinfulness of
historical humanity, on which and for which they were

95

founded. This sinfulness, which shows itself, in its
most terrifying form, in the relentless mutual anta-
gonism and laceration of single individuals as well as
of different races and nations, Wagner declares as
rising from the degeneration of the blood, which has
taken place, since humanity has turned, from the natural
and original vegetarian food, to the enjoyment of animal
flesh. This sealed its physical and moral decay, which
was necessarily followed by the degeneration of Christia-
nity from the pure teachings of the Saviour, as well
as by the corruption of our entire modern civilization,
with its delusive art and science. A true regeneration
of the human race, Wagner only hoped for in the
connection of the endeavors of the vegetarians, the
societies for temperance and prevention of cruelty to
animals, with those of christian socialism. Such a
regeneration must be the aim of all true religion and,
for this reason, must only contain the pure germ of
christian and indian teachings, free from the allegorical
additions of the different worships. Then art will
become a holy, purifying and religious act, »for divine
ecstasy cheerfully ascending lamentations*. Pity, from
which spring the three all-comprehensive virtues, charity,
faith and hope, Wagner, in unison with Schopen-
hauer, recognized to be the highest precept of true
religion. Together with Gobineau, he found the aryan
race and particularly the german people to be distin-
guished by the national peculiarities of pride and vera-
city, and for this reason more capable, than any other
race, of producing heroic natures. Against any inter-
mixture of the nobler races or nations with lower ones,
Wagner, together with the french scientist, laid eager
protest; in opposition to the latter however, he glori-
fied Christianity, the religion of the poor in spirit, of
whose salvation all men may equally participate, far
above the braminical religion, which, as the narrow
belief of one race, can effectuate true morality only
in the minority of its adherents.

95

These essays of Wagner could, only in a small
circle of readers, find full comprehension, and entire
approbation by still less. Their satirically polemical,
fundamental character already repelled many of those,
who otherwise were admirers of his art ; his aversion
to the » shallow* optimism, to the belief of the steady
improvement of the human race, they could understand,
but not unconditionally share. The other essays in
the »Bayreuther Blatter<, which, for the most part,
were held in the same strain, found still less notice
or approbation. What in Wagner's contributions was
not approved of, was still less permitted to his follo-
wers, even in those cases where it was quite apparent,
that they uttered his ideas at his commands. Besides
all this, the corypheus of the german literary world
held themselves aloof from the Bayreuth monthly, and
its contributors mostly employed a heavy, and some-
times even unwieldy language. These stylistic deficien-
cies, besides a certain narrowness of the tendencies,
often prevented the positively excellent contents of
some essays in the »Bayreuther Blatter* from making
a due impression; in spite of its undeniably good qua-
lities, the monthly has but little promoted its creator's
intention of gaining new, intelligent friends for his views
of art and of the world. All the more directly and
deeply, everyone was touched by the artistic creation
which, together with the last essays of Wagner for
his Bayreuth monthly, had reached entire perfection,
and which originated from the same chain of ideas,
the Biihnenweihfestspiel »Parsifal«.

The plan of forming the greatest franco-german
mediaeval poem into a musical drama, dates back to
the years in Zurich. It is not probable, however, that
before the completion of his »Nibelungen«, Wagner
earnestly thought of working it out. In the spring
of 1877, the poetical composition of »Parsifal« was
completed; the musical composition, protracted through
the space of several years, by the literary work with

Richard Wagner after a photograph by J. Albert
(Munich 1880).

97

which Wagner often interrupted himself, advanced
continually, and its plan was completed in April 1879.
The instrumentation of fragments of his work was, at
that time, already completed, so the prelude, which,
at the christmas-festival 1878, the Meister had per-
formed in his house, before numerous guests, by the
Meiningen court-orchestra. The instrumentation of the
entire work only reached completion in January 1882..
Repeated attacks of erysipelas obliged Wagner, since
the fall of 1879, to often interrupt his rigorous activity.
As a complete change of air seemed alone to promise
recuperation, he departed with his entire family, in De-
cember 1879, for Naples. Here he remained until mid-
summer; then he spent several months in Siena and
Venice, received in Munich the promise of King Lud-
wig, that henceforth he would formally and officially
accept the protectorate of the Buhnenfestspiele in
Bayreuth, and only returned in November 1880 to
Wahnfried. Here, in the following August, the piano-
rehearsals for » Parsifal « began, whose first performance
was, after several postponements, positively to take
place in the summer of 1882. Soon after the first
rehearsals however, Wagner hastened back to Italy.
Almost the entire winter he spent with his family in
Palerrno ; in spring, he returned home to Bayreuth by
slow stages. In July, the rehearsals for the Biihnen-
weihfestspiel began, for which King Ludwig had placed
orchestra and chorus of the Munich theatre, under the
leadership of Hermann Levi and Franz Fischer,
at Wagner's disposal. Again, as six years before,
artists from different german opera-stages had received
calls to Bayreuth, to sing the principal solo-roles. As,
this time, but one work was to be performed, the
rehearsals occupied but a few weeks, and already on
the 26''' of July 1882, the first performance of »Parsifal«
could take place, which, until the 29* of August, was
followed by fifteen more. In artistic perfection, the.
production of this work even excelled the Festspiele

Muncker, Wagner. 7

98

of 1 876-, but this time, the outward success also was
undoubted, in spite of the disparaging or mocking
reports of certain german newspapers. Even several
obdurate opponents of Wagnerian art, slowly capitulated,
before the Biihnenweihfestspiel ; the Meister, however,
supported by the present revenues of the performances,
already announced a repetition for the coming year.
Convinced that, by this means, his Festspiele would
gain the noblest attractiveness, and to his last drama
the worthiest representation would be secured, he deter-
mined, that henceforth his » Parsifal* was to be publicly
performed exclusively at Bayreuth.

The religious character with which Wagner had
impressed his Biihnenweihfestspiel, already necessitated
its being kept off the daily stages. The profoundest
of all mediaeval christian legends, of which the ger-
manic and romanic epic poetry had taken possession,
gave him the subject for his drama, the legend of the
holy Grail, the precious dish or chalice from which
Jesus took the last communion, in which Joseph von
Arimathaea caught the life-blood of the Saviour, which
later, in world-secluded* solitude, was faithfully guarded
by a chosen race of pure and pious knights, and of
Parzival, who, by the grace of God, was called upon,
to heal Amfortas, king of the Grail, from the disease
with which he was blighted for his sin, and to gain
for himself, after many wanderings and trials, the king-
dom of the Grail. The religious, mystical meaning of
mediaeval legend, however, Wagner deepened at all
points. In conformation with the philosophy of Schopen-
hauer, and in correspondence to the original teachings
of the braminic-buddhistic and christian religions, as
he had conceived them in his last 'essays in the »Bay-
reuther Blatter*, Wagner took, for the fundamental

idea of his workj_ fe^-TrggStiotroTtgrwiirto'Tiv e, IBF

morlitymg of all sensuajl y sinf ul' ~3esires , the practice
&t u nselhsn cTiSf ity ,"~tHe ~^redeernIng pity for all crea-
tures, and, at the same time, more strongly emphasized.

99

jDyJiiC^nm\»t\r frfepiije aantation. the symbolical references

to single episodesjn_J]i£Jiistoix_oflXlin§t:_r~~

Wolfram von Eschenbach's powerful epos gave
him the outline and principal characters for his action.
What here, however, was broadly spun out in many
traits, motives, episodes and personages, Wagner was
obliged to reduce to dramatic conciseness. For this
reason, he not only omitted numberless unimportant
characters occurring in the mediaeval legend, but often
concentrated different personages of the middle-high-
german poem into one form. Wolfram's Kundry, the
messenger of the Grail, and the demon-like, alluring
Orgeluse, he united into one being, which, besides,
he identified with Herodias, and endowed with sig-
nificant traits from the legend of the wandering jew,
and from the story of the penitent Magdalen. For his
Gurnemanz, the faithful companion in arms of Titurel,
the first king of the Grail, and of his son Amfortas,
Wagner borrowed only the name of the lord of the
castle, who, in Wolfram's poem, instructs the un-
worldly Parzival in chivalry; instead, he endowed him
with the qualities and actions of the old knight who,
on Good Friday, undertakes a pilgrimage, and par-
ticularly with those of the hermit Trevrizent in the
mediaeval legend. Single traits he borrowed from
other versions of the legend of the Grail, which he per-
haps had come to know through occasional reports of
french investigators, so, in particular, the fruitful idea
taken from french sources, that the bleeding lance, which
is exhibited in the castle of the Grail, and with which,
according to Wolfram, Amfortas was wounded, is the
same, with which Longinus once pierced the side of
the Saviour, as well as the supposition, that also the
kings of the Grail must abstain from woman's love,
and that the devil, through all manner of seductive
delusions, sought the undoing of the pure youth Parzi-
val. With the same purpose, Wagner's Klingsor, as the
master of devilish magic, fights against the chosen hero.

7*

100

For the character of his wizard, not only the form of
Wolfram's Klingsor of Capua floated before the eyes
of the dramatist, but besides it, that of the hungarian
sorcerer allied to infernal demons , who occurs in the
poem of the Wartburgkrieg , as well as in E. T. A.
Hoffmann's novel treating of the same contest of
minstrels, and that of the magician in Immermann's
myth »Merlin«, which, besides, was otherwise drawn
froni. In place of the perils, however, which await
Wolfram's Gawah in Klingsor's magic castle, Wagner
put the charming episode of the flower-girls, which
he took, with but slight alterations, which were necessi-
tated by the dramatic treatment, from the old poem
by the priest Lamprecht on Alexander the great.
Finally, in german folklegends, he found several traits
for inferior situations.

In a masterly manner, Wagner combined these
motives, drawn from the most varied sources into a
living, organic whole, and developed from them the
dramatic action, which is simple, but in all its parts
firmly organized and drawn on a large scale. Of
such an action, the mediaeval poems of the Grail were
one and all bare; they were moved by an entirely
epical spirit and style. The dramatic, fundamental idea
for Iiis work, Wagner received through a philological
error. Joseph Gorres, in the preface to the old-
■german » Lohengrin «, to which Wagner again was
much indebted, had written the name of the hero of
the Grail Parsifal , and had quite . incorrectly sought
to explain it from the arabian: »the pure or poor
fool«. As » guileless fool«, Wagner also introduced
his hero. To be able to heal Amfortas, this fool must
become »by pity enlightened «, without losing his purity;
he himself must experience the sufferings of those he
would redeem, without participating in their guilt. This
alone he can accomplish, by entirely and victoriously
withstanding the sensual temptation which assails him.
In him also, exists the tragical conflict between the

lOI

egotistic will and moral duty, but it does not, as other-
wise in tragedy, come to the customary issue. Parsifal
bows before the divine will, without first seeking to
rebel against it. He too commits a tragic wrong, for
which he suffers heavily: in pitiless folly he, at first,
does not understand the sufferings of Amfortas. This
guilt, however, of an entirely passive nature, cannot
be brought under the head of the conventional rules
of tragedy. In » Parsifal* generally, Wagner kept
himself more than ever free from these rules, and still
remained truly dramatic in the character of his repre-
sentation, in spite of the epical and lyrical elements
with which he lightly intermixed his action. Not merely
through his masterly treatment of the dialogue, did he
cover these seemingly undramatic elements, but demon-
strated rather, by the effect of his closely interwoven
poetry and music, that to a musical drama, -particularly
to a religiously sanctified subject, the same rules are
not applicable as to a spoken play of worldly contents.
As in its poetical treatment » Parsifal* reminded,
in fundamental ideas, in principal traits and even in
some details, of Wagner's earlier dramas, so the musi-
cal composition rested on the same foundations as all
that, since bis »Rheingold«, the Meister had created.
As well however, as on one side, the religious sacred-
ness of the subject often determined the more exalted
character of the music, so, on the other side, the action
necessitated numerous choruses, and even for the most
part, choruses in the older conception, whose effect
rested on letting a number of voices sing the single
vocal parts. Such choruses Wagner had avoided
since the composition of his »Nibelungen«. By returning
to them, he did not become faithless to any artistic
principle, as the truth of the representation, for whose
sake he had formerly rejected the concerted singing,
now required it ; just as it corresponded to the greater
simplicity of the religiously tinted action, that, together
with the versification and language of the drama, the

102

harmonic and melodic composition of single chorus-
and instrumental movements should become simpler
and occasionally even accord with the older church-
music. In vigorous freshness and powerful passion,
the composition of Wagner's »Parsifal« could not
compare with his earlier works : that lay in the solem-
nity of the religious drama; the wealth of the melodic
invention, however, as well as the splendor and im-
portance of the varied and skillful artistic execution,
showed the musical genius of the aging Meister to be
unimpaired in its entire abundance and strength.

The enthusiasm, with which » Parsifal*, during the
Festspiele of the summer 1882, was received, was the
grandest triumph for Wagner and his art. For the
second time, in much greater numbers than in 1876,
guests from all parts of the world assembled in Bay-
reuth for the sole purpose of hearing his work, this
time only one composition, whose performance occu-
pied the space of but few hours. In this sympathy, he
might in truth see a warrant, that, in the future, the
Festspiele would continu,e and, through their enlivening
example, would gradually be the school for a new
german dramatic style, which, above all, he sought to
found in them. Personally, Wagner was often troubled
with illness during the time of the Festspiele; never-
theless, he knew no fatigue, when it was necessary
to work for his art. Soon after the conclusion of
the Festspiele, he hurried with his family to Venice,
in the hope of there finding recreation. However, he
could not long endure entire inactivity. He wrote essays
for the »Bayreuther Blatter*, amongst them an account
of the artistic representation of » Parsifal* in the pre-
ceding summer, performed at Christmas, for a small
circle of friends, his symphony in C-sharp, which, fifty
years before, he had composed, and now and again
thought of the possibility' of dramatically executing the
plan of the »Sieger*, which dated from about the same
time and chain of ideas, as the first plan of » Parsifal*.

Palazzo Vendramin in Venice.

Preparations for the Festspiele of the coming summer,
earnestly occupied his attention. A sudden death tore
him away in the midst of his creative zeal. In the
Palazzo Vendramin, on the 13* of February 1883, he
succumbed to a violent attack of heart-disease. His body
was brought to Bayreuth, and there, on the iS'*" of
February, was buried, according to his own desire.

104

in the garden of his house. At all the large stations
on the route from Venice to Bayreuth, his friends
solemnly received his coffin; in his home, thousands
from all german provinces, representatives of sovereigns,
who called themselves friends of the deceased, german
artists, friends of his art, and the citizens of Bayreuth,
paid him the last honours. Besides Klopstock and
Grillparzer, no german poet had received similar
obsequies. If at their grave, however, mourning was
soon softened into a mild melancholy, there resounded,
at Wagner's coffin, the' loud and violent lament of
a sad, inconsolable grief. They had been ready for
death, and weary of work had passed away; their
departure had left no perceptible vacancy, either in
the life of those they had left behind or in the further
development of their art. He however, who as artist
exceeded both by far, had but just reached the pinnacle
of his career. There was still so much for him to
do, what no other than he could accomplish; his genius
was for so long a time yet necessary for german dra-
matic art. And with passionate warmth he was beloved
by numerous friends, who, for a lengthy space of time,
could not grasp the idea of his death.

In a full measure, he deserved this love. He was a
man as good as he was great. In his nature, height of
mind, depth of feeling and child-like amiability were
blended. The energetic strength of his will was paired
with heartfelt mildness, the susceptibility of his mood,
accountable from his many adversities and from his
heart-trouble, with a sincere desire for reconciliation,
the seriousness of his mind, which in social intercourse
involuntarily mastered all, with an inexhaustible love
for jest and humor. He loved and was mindful of
every creature, man or animal, that needed help or
sympathy. Courageous truthfulness was the foundation
of his character. Therefore, he was simple and natural
in his demeanor, and an outspoken enemy of all bom-
bast. He was proud, but modest in spite of his con-

105

sciousness of what he desired, knew and accomplished.
As his memory retained alive what long already was
passed, so he thankfully never forgot the good that
others had done him, and faithfully clung to his friends,
even if time and space separated him from them. Him-
self clear in his thoughts and intentions, he demanded
the same clearness in those, who wished to associate
with him. He did not ask of his friends that they
should understand his art, and still less that they should
agree with his opinions and judgements. But he justly
demanded of everyone, that he, without allowing him-
self to be deluded by strange prejudices, should, before
criticising, honestly seek to become acquainted with
his artistic aspirations, and not condemn with animosity,
or untruthfully deforfn, what he, with the noblest love
for art and his people, had created.

Wagner's works have now gained a home on
all german stages , and on many in foreign lands.
Though they sometimes are given in a mutilated form
or are unsatisfactorily produced, they are and remain
the delight of the enthusiastic spectator. Even the
narrow-minded censure of tinintelligent and ill-natured
critics, has, for the most part, been obliged to yield
to the universal approbation. No impartial judge of
our present music-life can deny the great and partly
very beneficial influence of Wagn'er on the composition
and execution of our modern music in particular. Until
now, the german dramatists have learned less from
him; but also to them, as well as to painters and
sculptors, he gave many fruitful incitements. Most
purely his spirit is preserved in his last great creation,
the Biihnenfestspiele in Bayreuth. They are the sacredly
to be kept legacy which he bequeathed his people.
The noble mind of his widow, supported by true friends
of his house and art, administers this heritage, with
an unselfish devotion and an artistic discernment, which
are above the censure of envious fault-finders. Nothing
human is absolulely perfect, not even the Festspiele in

io6

Bayreuth, which are dependent upon so many casualities ;
the ideal perfection of dramatic representation however,
which Wagner himself strove to acquire, has, to this
hour, been alone reached on the stage of Bayreuth,
and can only there and through those be attained, who
recognize it to be their sublimest vocation, to faithfully
fulfill the last will of the Meister.

c

V •s

a

o

List of illustrations.

1. Wagner's homestead in Leipsic. P. 7.

2. Samper's plan for a Festspielhouse in Munich. P. 74.

3. Wagner's dwelling-house in Munich, Briennerstrasse Nr. iS. P. 77.

4. Bayreuth seen from the Festspielhouse. P. 84.

5. Wagner's dwelling-house iWahnfried* in Bayreuth. P. 85.

6. The Biihnenfestspielhouse in Bayreuth. P. 88.

7. The auditorium of the Biihnenfestspielhouse in Bayreuth. P. 89.

8. The temple of the Grail. After the original sketch by Professor
Briickner in Coburg. (See preface.) P. 91.

9. The house in which Wagner died, Palazzo Vendramin in Venice.
P. 103.

10. Wagner's handwriting. After an autograph of the speech which
Wagner held at the laying of the corner-stone of the Festspiel-
house in Bayreuth, on the 22=1 of May 1872, in the possession
of the author. P. 107.

11. Frontispiece. Richard Wagner after an etching by Hubert Her-
komer (London 1877).

12. Picture I. Richard Wagner after a drawing by E. B. Kietz (1850).
After a heliogravure contained in the first volume of J. Kiirschner's
Wagnerjahrbuch.

13. Picture II. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen*
(Rheingold, scene ij. After the original sketch by Professor
Briickner in Coburg.

14. Picture III. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen*
(Walkiire, act I).

15. Picture IV. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen*
(Walkure, act III).

16. Picture V. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen«
(Siegfried, act I).

17. Picture VI. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen«
(Siegfried, act II).

18. Picture VII. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen*
(Gotterdammerung, act I).

19. Picture VIII. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen«
(Gotterdammerung, act II).

20. Picture IX. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen«
(Gotterdammerung, act III).

21. Picture X. Sketch of scenery to the »Ring des Nibelungen*
(Gotterdammerung, last scene).

22. Picture XI. Sketch of scenery to >Parsifal« (act I, scene l).

23. Picture XII. Sketch of scenery to >Parsifal« (act I, trans-
formation-scenery).

J24. Picture XIII. Sketch of scenery to »Parsifal« (act II, scene l).

25. Picture XIV. Richard Wagner after a photograph by Elhot
and Fry (London 1877).

26. Picture XV. Richard Wagner after a photograph by J. Albert
(Munich 1880).

_2^7. Picture XVI. Sketch of scenery to »Parsifal«: (act II, scene 2).
-ISK. Picture XVII. Sketch of scenery to >Parsifal« (act III, scene l).

29. Double-picture I. From the original score of the »Walkiire*
(act I). After the original score belonging to the posthumous
papers of King Ludwig II. (See preface.)

30. Double-picture II. From the original score of the »WaIkure«
(act III).

3 1 . Double-picture III. The Biihnenfestspielhouse in Bayreuth. Dia-
gram of the amphitheater.

Index of Wagner's works.

A capitulation 82.

A communication to my friends

50-

Art and climate 46, 47.

Art and revolution 45, 46.

Autobiographical sketch 30.

Bayreuther Blatter 92 — 96.

Bianca and Giuseppe 17.

Essay on Beethoven 81, 82.

Essay on leading 80.

Essay on state and religion 75.

Essay on the german opera 13.

Essays and tales written in Paris
20 — 22.

Faust-ouverture 20.

Festival march for the celebration
of the centennial of the United-
States of North- America 89.

Five poems 65.

Frederic Barbarossa 39.

German art and german politics.
79, 80.

Jesus of Nazareth 40, 41.

Judaism in music 49, 50.

Letter on Liszt's symphonic com-
positions 59, 60.

Lohengrin 35—39-

March in honour of the emperor
82, 86.

March of homage 75.

On actors and singers 87.

Opera and drama 46 — -49.

Parsifal 65, 96—102.

Religion and art 94 — 96.

Rienzi 18, 19, 22 — 25, 30.

Siegfried-idyll 81.

Siegfried's death 39, 40, 50.

Songs composed in Paris 20.

Symphony in C-sharp 8, 102.

Tannhauser 30 — 36, 66, 67.

The fairies 9 — 12.

The flying Dutchman 25 — 30.

The happy bear-family 17.

The interdiction of love 13 — 16.

The love-feast of the apostles 31.

The master-singers of Nuremberg
35, 68-71, 78.

The music of the future 67.

The ring of the Nibelung 50 —
60, 68, 71, 72, 75, 78, 84,
88—92.

The Saracenic virgin 29.

The victors 65, 102.

The wedding 8, 9.

The Wibelungs 39, 40.'

The work of art of the future

46—49.
Tristan and Isolde 61 — 66, 68,

75-
Wieland the smith 51.

ftf*&

5) .'^> r^

Gallery reserved for royalty.

t; sJLiU5L_l-iLjLJX&f ,;

Right.

Left.

The Buhnenfestspielhouse in Bayreulh. Diagram of the Amphitheater.

Publications of the

Publishing firm of C. C. Buehner

Buchner Bros, royal bavarian court publishers.
Bamberg.

Just appeared in our publishing firm:

King Ludwig I. of Bavaria

in letters to his son

King otto of Greece.

By Dr. Ludwig Trost, privy counsellor of the legation,

r. b. court and state archivist.

Containing more than 200 pages. 8°. Handsomely bound.

Paper binding 6 Mk.; in brocade half binding 9 Mk.

The book forms not alone a valuable contribution to the
characterization of King Ludwig I. of Bavaria and of King Otto
of Greece, but also contains a fill of new and interesting dates
c6nceming Queen Theresa, King Ludwig IL, Princeregent
Luitpold and the other members of the royal bavarian family;
the political conditions of Bavaria and Germany , the occurrences
of the year 1848, the artistic creations of Ludwig I. and the artistic
life in his timt are glanced upon, finally, the history of Greece
during the reign of King Otto is in political, as well as diplomatic
respect, significantly illuminated, in a manner which is readily ex-
planable by the royal author's intimate knowledge of all circum-
stances. Everything founds on the views of King Ludwig I., m
all important points the King's words are even cited, after a pecu-
liarly clear method employed by the author, which, also from the
standpoint of scientific technic, secures the work an eminent position
in our modern literature. Supplement II deserves especial notice, as
it is composed of a large number of hitherto unknown letters from
King Ludwig I. to Queen Amalie of Greece.

In many respects, the book may be regarded as an actually
? poUtical-diplomatic novelty on the book-market, and enjoys the ad-
f- Vantage of being, not alone for the student and friend of history
but also for cultivated men and women, solid , fascinatmg and
attractive reading matter, no doubt it will beyond the bonnda„es
of Bavaria, meet with a like interest. The book is dedicated to
Dr von Muller, minister of public worship and instruction.

Heigel, Dr. K. Th. and Dr. Grauert.

Treatises from the historical Seminary of the
University in Munich.

Solely treatises which are taken directly from the sources them-
selves and offer important, new points, are accepted in this collection,
whose aim is to prevent, that scientifically valuable works should
disappear in the flood of treatises which are brought to light by
the graduation system. The history of persons or events, which
claim the public interest, as well as important additions to the
criticism of sources, are the contents of the single volumes, each
of which forms a complete whole and is singly sold.

The price of the single volumes is in conformation with
their size.

The first volume, comprising 328 pages, contains:

Gregor HeiralDurg

b y Paul Joachimson — Price 8 Mk.

IBavafiaii Ljibra.ry.

Volume I. Reinhardstoettner, Martinus Balticus.
Destouches, Court order of knights.
Holland, Count Pocci.

Haushofer, Types of workingmen. "fl

R6e, Peter Candid. 2.

Riggaiier, Cabinet of Coins. q

Vo^, Elias Holl.

Mayerhofer, Schleissheim. m,

Leitschuh, Germanic Museum. jO

Wegele, Aventin. g"

Hefner-Alteneck, National Museum. (jq

Kluckhohn, Westenrieder. fj*

Gunther, Martin Behaim.

Muncker, Friedrich Ruckert. ^

Trautmann, Oberammergau. S*

Gmelin, St. Michael's Church. g

Reinhardstoettner, Land and People in 3

the bavarian Forest.
Brenner, Dialects. '^

Gfitze, Hans Sachs. g

Holland, Horschelt. pi^

Haushofer, Alpine Landscape and alpine

Legend. ^

Mummenhoff, Old Nuremberg.
von Heigel, Karl Stieler.
Braunmiihl, Scheiner.
Dr. Heigel, Nymphenburg.
26.* Muncker, Richard Wagner.

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Bavarian Library, founded and published by Karl
von Reinhardstoettner and Karl Traut-
mann. Vol. i — 26. Bamberg, Buchner's publish-
ing company.

Since 1889 there appear under this title a series of mono-
graphs on the history of culture and the ethnology of Bavaria,
which, in the choice of the subjects, as well as in the diction
and outer fittings, are worthy of the highest praise. Each volume
forms in itself a complete whole, and can, with a slight addition
of the price, be singly purchased.

The single landscapes, which compose the present Bavaria, shall
be equally considered: particular attention is given to the history
of bavarian art collections ; to it belong vol. 6 : The royal Cabinet
of Coins (in Munich) by Hans Riggauer, vol. 9: The Ger-
manic Museum in Nuremberg by Friedr. Leitschuh, vol. 11 :
The bavarian National Museum by J. vonHefner-Alteneck.
In the territory of the history of men of learning and artists
we find : vol. I: Martinus Balticus by K. von Reinhard-
.stoettner, vol. 3: Franz, Count of Pocci by Hyacinth
Holland, vol. 5: Peter Candid by P. J. R^e, vol. 7: Elias
Holl by Wilh. Vogt, vol. lO: Aventin by Franz X. von
Wegele, vol. 12; Lorenz von Westenrieder by A. Kluck-
hohn, vol. 13: Martin Behaira by Sigmund Gunther,
vol. 14: Friedrich Riickert by Franz Muncker, vol. 19:
Hans Sachs by Edmund Gotze, vol. 20: Theodor Hor-
schelt by Hyacinth Holland, vol. 23: Karl Stieler by
KarlvonHeigel. Vol. 8; Schleissheim by Johann Mayer-
hofer, vol. i6r The St.. Michael's Church in Munich by
Leopold Gmelin, and vol. 25: Nymphenburg by Dr. Heigel,
treat of single prominent monuments of art, and finally, vol. 2 of the
St. George Court order of knights by Ernst v. Des-
t ouches. To ethnology and the description of countries are
dedicated vols. 4 and 22: Types of Workingmen from
the bavarian Alps, and alpine Landscape and alpine
Legend by Max Haushofer, vol. 15: Oberammergau
by Karl Trautmann and vol. 17: Land and People in
the bavarian Forest by Karl von Reinhardstoettner,
vol. 18: Dialect and Booklanguage in Bavaria by Oscar
Brenner, vol. 22: Old Nuremberg by Ernst Mummen-
hoff.

As peculiarly fitted for so-called travelling companions, that
is, for most reliable guides, we, in particular, call attention to the
. volume contained in the
p^ „Bavarian Library"

o Alpine Landscape and alpine Legend
'^ in the bavarian Mountains.

^ The time is approaching in which happy people, from all

S parts of Germany, stream together, in the grand natural surroun-
M dings of the high-lands. What delightful travelling reading does this
^ little book afford, whose celebrated author has so well done his best,
O to fascinatingly depict the, in itself, beautiful subject, that every
U reader will recall the book with the utmost satisfaction. The nature
of the book requires, that it be more than rich in illustrations,
which have been drawn by the masterly hand of K. Th. Meyer
in Basel.

fU

Uh Extremely rich in illustrations, particularly in exquisite archi-

Ph tectural pictures, is the small volume

o Hymphenburg

, by P. Th. Heigel.

^ Nymphenburg may not be able to compete with the proud

§ grandeur of Versailles, but the celebrated castle of the bavarian

i_i princes, is in so rich a measure endowed with beauty and splendor,
that it fascinates the most fastidious visitor, and delightfully attracts

y the friend and connoisseur of history. No visitor of Munich shovild

*C miss a visit to the renowned castle, and this little book will be a

P-c pleasant remembrance.

Karl Stieler

by Karl von Heigel.

. As heretofore, so in the present time and far into the distant

P_i future, the tender-hearted, noble-minded poet, who drew from the

full fountain of his true love and rich knowledge of land and people,
2. to send forth into the world, in word and letter, the poetry of the

german highlands, will remain one of the most popular authors.
^ The number of his admirers is legion, and to them, Heigel has
§ given the biography, which he has drawn with a loving hand. This
^ volume of the »Bavarian Library*, will gain many friends. To

Heigel's judicious representation, which shows the most tender love
(J and admiration of the poet, is given as a valuable addition, twelve
"C hitherto unpublished poems, written in his youth, and fifteen letters
Ph to his mother. The little book is profusely illustrated, and also

contains a portrait of the poet.

The display in the show-window alone, is a guarantee
for a large sale!

Types of Workingmen

from the bavarian Alps 2!

by Max Haushofer <T>

is decidedly one of the most fascinating volumes. In a masterly
manner, the renowned author enrolls an ethnographical picture of S
convincing power and life; through him, we live and feel with the ?^
sturdily strong sons of the mountains, participate in their ioys and _^
sorrows, envy the huntsman on his grandly beautiful paths, breathe O
the fragrant air of the dense forests, and hear the rush and roar of
the wildly foaming Achen, of the rockrending mountain passes, with
the taciturn, lonely people of wood-fellers and raftsmen.

>v

OLD NUREMBERG

BY FRANZ MUMMENHOFF.

n

An excellent side-piece to the just mentioned book. As in
the former, the power, the abundance of nature, the wild battle "
between man and the elements attract us, so in this book, it is g
the grandeur of mind, the art, the honorable character of the ??
citizens of this city , which is called the pearl in the heart of
Germany, which exert an irrisistible fascination. Old Nuremberg's "^
grand buildings, old Nuremberg's imperishable splendor, old Nurem-
berg's valiant people are revealed to the reader in a mariner, that '^
he will forever keep this httle volume in thankful remembrance. *

Annals of the History of Munich, founded

and published by Karl von Reinhardstoettner
and Karl Trautmann. Annual publication i — 3.
Munich, J. Lindauer and Bamberg, Buchner 1887 — 1 889.

The same men of letters, who joined in the publication of
the just criticised »Bavarian Library*, have called these annals into
life. This enterprise can lay fully justified claim to the approbation
of all contemporaries, as it, above all, is dedicated to the history
of culture of the beautiful bavarian capital. The intellectual signi-
ficance of Munich, dates by no means, as is commonly supposed,
only from the times of King Ludwig I. It is true, that he, very
properly may be regarded, as the real creator of modern Munich,
particularly in so far, as its architectural character is concerned : this
city however, was already during the latter part of the middle-ages,
especially in the l6th and 17'h centuries, the centre and radiation
point of action of many men, distinguished in art and science, and

the seat of a rich and artistically inclined court. The editors of
the annals, therefore very correctly accentuate the fertility of their
field of labor. Until now, in the want of an own local society for
history, Munich's history of culture has always been only casually
treated. The three first volumes of the new periodical in question,
are a sure warrant, that from now on, the history of culture of
this, for the entire fatherland so important and influential metropolis,
will receive the attention it deserves. That the annals do not
exclusively bind themselves to the history of the city of Munich,
but also shall include the history of the closer and more distant
surroundings of Munich into its limits, can only be approved of;
where, indeed, is in such a centre of civilization the exact line of
the local and outward occurrences to be drawn?

The list of those who have hitherto been contributors, shows
only names of best repute. Two of them, have departed from this
life , after having devoted to this enterprise also , a part of their
activity: Nussbaum, whose noblest merit may have been, that,
whenever he could, he never scorned to make the fruits of his
eminent knowledge and skill, in a popular and beautiful form,
accessible to the widest circles, and Franz Trautmann, the amiable
and large-souled narrator, whose name will ever remain interwoven
with his native city, Munich, whose historical peculiarities he so
warmly and attractively knew to describe.

Nineteenth to twentyeighth thousand!

Major Gaetano Casati.

Ten years in Aequatoria and the return
with Emin Pascha.

2 volumes.
Price elegantly bound 22 Mk. Price, paperbinding 20 Mk.
40 numbers for 50 Pf. each.
The press of the entire cultivated globe has criti-
cised this work in the most eminent manner.

Of the numerous flattering criticisms which have reached us,
we hasten to publish only a few, and take the liberty of solicitously
recommending them, to the notice of all those who take interest
in us and to an honourable public.

Leipziger lUustrierte Zeitung. Mth of February 1891.

Casati's work differs in the reading entirely from other tra-
velling descriptions. Not alone the important geographical dis-
coveries, in a land which is coveted by many, are described and
explained by maps, not alone the excellent social and ethnographical
descriptions are made clear to us by numerous illustrations, not
alone the intricate circumstances which brought about the fall of
Emin and with him Aquatoria, are here clearly depicted, the whole
is permeated with a breath of truthfulness and openness, which
does not for a moment leave the reader in doubt, that in the fas-
cinating descriptions of the modest author, he hears the truth and
nothing but the truth.

AUgemeine Zeitung Mfinchen.

Supplement 21st of February 1891.

Casati's best characterization is his book. It is, as Manfred
Camperio remarks, the old Bersagliere who speaks from it. The
occurrences and impressions are, with the assistance of an immense
memory — the greater part of his diaries and memoranda were lost
in Unjoro — so represented, as though it had but just happened, and
with unequalled freshness and vigor. To be able so to observe and
think like u man of Casati's nature, one needs at least two things :
u sharp eye and a warm heart.

Miinchner Neueste Nachrichten. 11 '^i of February 1891.

In consideration of the immense literature on Africa, which
floods the bookmarket in our days, and renders it almost impossible,
even for the professional, to see his way, every new work has a
difficult position, and only through particular advantages can become
known in wider circles. Casati's travelling memoirs, which have
just appeared in german garb, and besides, in a beautiful one, belong
to these favored books; the adventures of the bold man, who, under
the most difficult circumstances for nearly a full decennary braved
the treacheries of the dark quarter of the globe , as well as its
scientific contents, may secure it such an exceptional position.

Borsen-Zeitung Berlin. 19* of February 1891.

We have within the last years seen many travelling descriptions
of Africa appear, this work however, peculiarly moves us; for we
have, meantime, discovered, how much this enthusiastic traveller
has suffered in the service of science and for the exploration of
Africa, and how modestly and nobly he has issued from all dangers.
Emin Pascha and Casati have in hot Africa, under dangerous cir-
cumstances become true friends, and their names will for all times
remain linked as those of truly unselfish, great men.

The Kreuzzeitung writes :

Gaetano Casati »io years in Aequatoria and return
with Emin Pascha«. C. C. Buchner's publishing firm (Buchnei-
Bros. royal bavarian court publishers) Bamberg. Price, 2 volumes
paperbound, each 10 Mk. Handsomely bound, each II Mk. or 40 sub-
scriptions, each for 50 Pf.

Amongst the nev?est publications in the field of Africa explo-
rations, the work in question by Major Casati, takes a first rank.
The preface of his friend. Captain Manfred Camperio , acquaints
us with the person of the hero, for so the bold traveller may rightly
be called. He describes him, very justly, as a man of great energy
and of modest, upright character, which becomes convincingly
apparent in the entire manner in which he depicts his experiences.
In no part of his work does he deem himself wiser than others,
therefore he also, shows in a clear light the merits of other men,
such as Dr. Junker, Schweinfurth, and Major von Wissmann. A
close friendship binds him to Emin Pascha , to whom he showed
himself devoted in joy and sorrow. After the latter's unfortunate
fall from the window in Sansibar, Casati not only remained with
him for his sake during months, in which he carefully nursed him,
but also did all in his power in Kairo to assist his friend in obtaining
from the egyptian government the salary, which was long already
due to him.

True to his principles only to write the truth, Casati treats
the character of Emin, his actions in the aequatorial regions in
peace and war, Emin's pretended rescue by Stanley, which actually
turned out to be the rescue of Stanley by Emin. At the same
time, he ignores the faults of Emin as little as he, on the other
side, openly expresses his opinion of the english explorer : » Stanley
(as Casati says) is a man, distinguished by the power of his nature,
the decisiveness of his heart, the vigor of his spirit and an iron
will. Jealously mindful of his own authority, he keeps off all outer
influences, and asks no advice. Difficulties do not discourage him,
misfortune does not frighten him; with extraordinary rapidity of
mind, he quickly finds expedients, and extricates himself from all
embarrassments. Absolute and hard in the fulfillment of his duty,
not always guardful against too hurried or mistaken judgements, he
can become so embittered by indecision and hesitation, that he
loses his generally preserved dignity and his bearing, which tends
to gravity. Careful and sparing in speech, little devoted to society,
he arouses no feeling of sympathy ; after frequent association, how-
ever, he seems more agreeable through the frankness of his con-
duct, the precision of his speech and the refinement of the gentle-
man.* The objectivity of his judgement, makes Casati's work parti-
cularly valuable ; yes, it would, even if it touched less closely upon
the Emin-Stanley question, by no means lose its significance, for
it offers in itself a grand history of the dark quarter of the globe;

of the highest geographical and ethnographical value. At the same
time, the book is exceedingly fascinatingly and logically written, a
fact, that deserves all the more admiration, when we consider, that
Casati was obliged to write a great part of his diary from memory,
as the majority of his papers had been robbed at the instigation
of the intriguing King Tschua. This is also the reason, why Casati
was not able to publish his book sooner. Eminently interesting is the
description of the agitation of Mahdi Mahomed or shortly Mahdi,
the false prophet, who played so important a rSle in Emin's des-
tiny ; highly touching is the description of Casati's sufferings during
the time of his imprisonment by King Tschua, and of his flight.
Often in danger of death, he warded off his foes through personal
courage, and won the negroes by speaking kindly to them. The
fact, that he was able to converse with the strange nations in their
own tongue, gave him a deep insight into the national life of
numerous african tribes, which again led to results in the history
of culture. For this reason , not only the student of geography
can draw with success from Casati's book, but also the students of
philology and of the history of culture find rich gain, not less than
the students of psychology and anthropology. Interesting are the
fables, which were related to the traveller, as they are preserved

• in the traditions of the different tribes, so the fables of the 'leo-
pard and the dog«, of the »elephant and the shrew-mouse«, of the

t »dead man and the moon« etc. Most wonderful are the accounts
he gives us of the many dangers which he encountered, how he
escaped from the dagger of murderous bands, how he was no less

f'threatened by dangerous illness than by wild animals, how he was
forced to stand starvation, exhausting marches in bogs, imprisonment,
sentence to death, and again isolation almost for years, in short,
every manner of misfortune. So the book offers a plenty of what
is interesting ; it simply speaks for itself, and would not even have
necessitated the loud advertisement of the publisher at once to
gain the already large sale. Numerous excellent, artistically ex-
ecuted illustrations (technic of Dr. E. Albert and Co. in Munich),
effectively elucidate the throughout fascinating work.

Second Voyage of Investigation to Palestine
besides hours of religion at the Cradle of
Christendom by Prof. Dr. J. N. Sep p.

Whilst all eyes are turned to eastern Africa, Russians and
Frenchmen are gaining more and more ground in the holy land.
Happily, Prussia has laid hand on the ruins of the hospital of the
order of Malta in Jerusalem, for which act the rehgious fraternity
lately expressed their thanks to the author of the new book, as he
occasioned the acquisition. Within the last fifty years, Palestine
has been rediscovered, as Dr. Robinson of Ne^^' York topographically
decided the places of the old testament, Dr. Sepp those of the
new, a work which required unusual studies in languages and other
branches belonging to this subject. Both have twice, with all
learned preparations, made the voyage, and remained there for a
considerable length of time. In this book, the author, who has
already travelled so far, laid down the results of the second journey.

The » small Gallerystudies« by Dr. Th. Frimmei,

assistant at the royal austrian collections of art, seek, on the one
hand, to deepen the comprehension of old paintings in the large
circle of picture lovers and particularly of collectors , and , on the
other hand, to draw the notice of art scholars to pictures, which
hitherto, have been little or not at all, studied. Above all, he calls
attention, in an entirely comprehensible fashion, to several hidden
difficulties of connoisseurship,* warns against superficiality in deter-
mining and buying pictures, and lastly, gives a number of reliable
new discoveries of the painters of diiferent pictures and of well
founded conjectures , so that the small gallerystudies are , by no
means , extracts from large existing catalogues , but are to be re-
garded as entirely independent investigations , based on extensive,
comparing studies. The book contains numerous illustrations, and
appears in irregular deliveries, encompassing 3 sheets, each for the
price of 1 Mk. The publishing firm retains the right of issuing
double and triple deliveries.

Cornell University Library
ML 410.W1M96 1S91a

Richard Wagner; a sketch of his life and

3 1924 017 621 933

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